Mice play in the corner, as if it were their own,
a raccoon skitters across the empty store.
Possum, on a shelf knocks food boxes to the floor.

Vines grow undeterred, climbing telephone poles with
lines hanging like the limbs of a long dead spider.
Grass grows in the cracks of the unused street.

A page from a newspaper rolls and twists in the breeze,
it’s words unread. The new city dwellers
read nothing; survival is their only care.

The impermanence of all that was wrought is
barely noticed by those who make nothing.
Dogs fight, cats and skunks give birth.

Religion and politics are gone, schools are empty.
Cars rust, houses crumble, skyscrapers fall.
The world of humans was not real.