(It’s Not) The End of the World
Pavement boils in the city’s breath.
Commuters drift through digital haze,
fingers scrolling, eyes numbed,
reality twisted by algorithms.
A crimson glare bleeds down
through glass towers,
branding every building with threat.
But nobody looks up—
habit is gospel,
denial the only safety net.
Engines choke in gridlocked confession,
horns wailing, tempers frayed.
Each driver cursing the hour,
too hollow to feel
the apocalypse simmering in the air.
Shop windows flicker with false peace,
mannequins posed in riot gear.
Sirens coil through traffic jams
while everyone swallows the fear.
Across the avenue, a woman in heels
films her latte for a sponsored post,
blind to the bleeding skyline,
drowning in the likes she craves.
A man in a suit adjusts his tie,
ignores the red cast staining his skin—
he’s got meetings to fake,
debts to dodge,
no room left for dread.
Children walk home beneath roiling clouds,
faces washed in cartoon blue.
Parents drone about weather, about school,
refusing to see what’s overhead.
Every newsfeed preaches normalcy,
deflection dressed up as care.
Meteorologists call it an anomaly—
as if terror were just heat.
The news loops, anchors smiling through code,
calling the rupture an optical trick,
just another storm moving through.
Politicians tweet their hollow concern,
then log off to trade stocks.
Analysts analyze. Priests hold fast.
Prophets tally the paradox.
Nobody’s worried, they say on TV.
No reason to panic. Stay calm.
But the sky deepens red,
the streets grow quiet,
tension buried under practiced aplomb.
Neighbors fire up the grill,
laugh too loud, pass beers like communion at dusk.
Nobody asks why the birds have vanished,
why hope tastes like rust.
The air is thick, metallic, wrong.
Denial is a drug in every lung.
Dread swallowed with pills,
prayers tangled on the tongue.
In stairwells, lovers move in silence,
hunger sharpened by unknown fear.
Old men smoke on splintered stoops,
recounting history with dead eyes.
Somewhere a child asks,
“Is it broken, the sky?”
No one answers.
Parents are busy—pretending,
rehearsing their smiles,
not trying.
From the rooftops, the city is beautiful
in its death mask.
A thousand windows catching the red.
Still, nobody asks.
Underneath this calm—engineered, enforced—
something trembles through everything.
A ripple beneath the laughter,
a silence where even traffic has stopped singing.
There’s comfort in ignoring the cracks,
in blaming clouds for the stain,
pretending a world on fire
is just another day,
just a bit of rain.
A secret kept in every handshake.
A tremor hiding in every joke.
As if playing along
could stop the sky from falling,
the spell from shattering,
the rules from choking.
We cling to ritual, rinse, repeat—
all to hold off what’s coming.
Yet everyone feels it:
the hush, the weight,
the ground shaking beneath us.
It’s not the end, the headlines scream.
Just light and color. No blame.
But hearts betray the script,
beating harder,
unable to play the game.
Somewhere the first mistake slips through.
A truth overdue in the air.
It’s not the end,
but it’s nothing the same.
The world keeps spinning.
So does the shame.
We keep smiling. Keep scrolling. Keep buying the lie.
Pretending the crimson overhead
is just an oddity,
just weather.
But shadows stretch longer,
the silence thickens,
comfort becomes a costume
that no longer fits.
We live and die by habit,
by faith in what’s false,
while the world tilts quietly,
ready to tip.
Let them keep chanting it’s not the end—
each denial a prayer we can’t defend.
We carry on. We pretend. We refuse to break.
Yet something’s begun,
and nothing will be the same.
It’s not the end of the world,
not if you ask.
But it’s the first mistake,
and we’re all unmasked.