Millennial Villanelle

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Millennial Villanelle

(During a period of his madness, Nietzsche would say certain sentences over 
and over:  "I am dead because I am stupid," and  "I have a fine feeling for things.")

                                        
I am dead because I am stupid.
I tease out fresh slivers of fear with antediluvian fingers;
I have a fine feeling for things.

From out of the sun they will come, like fighter pilots;
Smart missiles with a fetish for the heat.
I am dead because I am stupid.

From the first time I saw fire, I scorched my fingers
Incinerating sinful ants in my secret universe of smoke.
I once had a fine feeling for things.

The world is watched by a Sphinx with an offended nose,
A hybrid fossil of Cheops and Napoleon;
They are dead because they were stupid.

Sin remains cloaked in robes as old as funeral pyres.  
So we seek absolution under Everest's anaerobic blanket;
Mankind has a fine feeling for such things.

We try to murder the ocean with our tiny spearguns. 
The sun drinks up the sea and the sky; the earth shall be burnt.
Because we are stupid, we will die,
Along with all our fine feeling for things.

Richard C.

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