O How Deep Humanity Is Bogged and Buried in the Underworld

 

In and out of episodes
of loves and lives and deaths
slip migrant, scrappy souls—
to do and say, in turn,

to others and themselves
what they desire,
thus testing one another—

how far they have gone
off the deep end,
how much further
they can fall to pieces,

and yet always hoping
the very next episode
will be their all-time favorite.

One can see how much
mortals have learned
to disbelieve the soul
and what is real—

for so many struggle to live,
to love, and to die
as if to measure
how far they can get away

with shearing and skirting,
rigging—or undoing—
what is true and real;
and so we keep running

into one another’s desires,
replaying endless reruns
of Divine Comedy—
most of it set in Hell,

and, frankly, not something
so beautiful or fine
as to merit
the beatific gaze of the gods,

but rather the aberrant delight
of devils at play—

which means something grave
remains out of joint,

since so many vie—and would kill,
do their worst—
just to knock
at an eisodos, an entrance

to some Underworld,
ever more deviant than before,
to become yet another epeisodion,
another add-on

to the pageant
of human tragedies and follies.