Paradise Reclaimed

In the forest beyond the mountains,
beyond the lake of the last man,
lies a creature unworshipped.

Once, he sired a pantheon of gods
and temples were raised,
where vestal maidens
tended to his followers,
offered charms and alms and prophecies,
oracles of a future where priests claimed
the heavens and left the gods behind,
preferring moondust to earth,
sterility to nature, progress to ether.

His children objected to this usurpation,
but he ignored their despair,
for humanity has left his home
and he is again lord of all he surveys,
he is God in his heaven.

And the man in the moon has hidden
his face, buried beneath a pilgrim swarm
who breathe in nothing but their failure,
a marooned colony forever presented
with the prize they abandoned.
Bitter are their tears beneath poisonous skies,
whilst clear run the waters of earth.

The God of the woods is sanguine,
all is right at last with his world,
as it was before, so it is again.