Complicated Reality

It's a race to the finish, but ranked in reverse,

to be the last species standing on the planet Earth.

The rules are pretty simple: there has to be land

and you need a least a foot and a leg to stand,

if no one comes around for one entire year,

congratulations, you win, you're the last one here.

It's starting to heat up, both the planet and the race

as the humans with pollution make the end accelerate

it's a tragic strategy, toxic in the worst of ways,

but they weren't prepared when the sun let off some gamma rays.

Batteries and satellites all melted on the spot

and without all their machines, humans were quickly not.

So the pigeons and the rats both saw an opportunity

and dominated other vermin with uneasy unity

The birds scavenged the surface, the rats ate underneath.

Until the rats grew wings, and the pigeons built new teeth.

The war between the two was swift but ineffective

since mutual destruction was the only real objective.

Rising from the rubble, the ants are still surviving

with no birds around to eat them, they suddenly were thriving

Queendoms stretching from one horizon to the other

with an internet of chemicals they talk to one another.

I can't quite wrap my head around formic forms of government

but they voted on a trip to space, and just like that, up they went.

With most the food chain missing, the competition's tight

Some crabs out near the shores seem to be getting by alright

but as the days get hotter, they spend more and more time swimming

as long as they stick a foot out time to time, they could be winning

But one year every crab was busy, hustle, bustle, side by side.

And no one thought to go to land, and so they were disqualified

That left a flock of cautious owls, hidden in the northern woods

who hooted softly when they won, unsure that it was really good

They may have beat the competition, but the fields were dull and plain

they went from being noble hunters, to scavenging remains

But companionship does come around, some other life appears

as the cicadas, who weren't players, swarm every seven years.