I can­not talk to peo­ple; what I need has out­paced the spo­ken lan­guage. I com­pen­sate by drop­ping words, build­ing sen­tences like air­planes or beer cans, hand ges­tures all the time, a new apoc­o­pa­tion. Link­ing verbs, prepo­si­tions, ar­ti­cles, and most ad­verbs have dis­ap­peared from my speech. I talk in nouns and gut­tural in­to­na­tions. The com­mu­ni­ca­tion age has left me un­able to com­mu­ni­cate.

I’m not sure any­one un­der­stands our tech­nol­ogy any­more; every­one I’ve met who said they did was try­ing to sell me a cell­phone. I think we’re over­due for a dark age; I can­not be the only one who feels this. Peo­ple who slept through his­tory are doomed to have night­mares about it. Peo­ple like me. I used to dream about car crashes and now I dream in ring­tones. Maybe this is the year we go back to liv­ing in caves.

I went to the river park to take the aus­pices. The pi­geons were obese, the geese were dis­ori­ented and honk­ing at ter­ri­ers, a mur­mu­ra­tion of star­lings was shit­ting on every­thing. I wanted to spread the en­trails, ex­am­ine the hid­den parts, but there were some chil­dren, and a cop.

When I read the paper, I feel like a credit as­ses­sor look­ing at the bal­ance sheet for the Heaven’s Gate cult the day be­fore the comet passed. Like Cas­san­dra pac­ing be­hind the crenela­tions. The Ouija board di­rects me to web­sites whose do­mains have lapsed. If it’s all the same to you, I’d pre­fer to keep my proph­e­sies a lit­tle vague.

Trial by sea­weed. Trial by bed­bug. Trial by sur­rounded by wolves.

Scenes from a Bruck­heimer movie. Emetic tableaux. The sky­line will even it­self out, the works of man and dirt will con­verge, and it will hap­pen very quickly. There will be a lot of scream­ing. A lot of scream­ing.

I’m com­pil­ing a hand­book for the peo­ple who come out of the ashes, a Fox­fire for the dis­con­nected. The first chap­ter will be a les­son on pho­net­ics, pic­tures of dogs and frogs and logs and hope­fully a speaker can be­come a reader. Med­i­c­i­nal uses for cayenne pep­per and super glue. Syn­the­sis of al­garot and al­co­hol. Sem­a­phore and the hobo cant. Nut­meg and Aqua Dots. Germ the­ory might not make the cut. The last page will be Eliz­a­beth Bishop.

If I sur­vive, I’m going to adopt the boot­strap ver­nac­u­lar, the red­neck trochee, the hay in the cor­ner of the mouth. I’m going to pref­ace every­thing I say with “Now I think.” The over­alls I bought at Roses will no longer be in­ap­pro­pri­ate. I will not be­come a war­lord. I will not be­come a war­lord. I will be Kevin Cost­ner in the Post­man. I will not be Kevin Cost­ner in Wa­ter­world. I will try to be Kevin Cost­ner in Dances with Wolves but I will lack aplomb, though I will see all my pets shot in front of me. I may also be ac­cused of trea­son.

I will show up at a high school, pre­tend­ing to be mak­ing court ap­pointed amends, here to bear per­sonal tes­ti­mony that yes, metham­phet­a­mine is a ter­ri­ble life de­ci­sion. When I get up to that lectern, I’ll break from the script. I will tell them about Savonarola, Quis­ling, Tina Turner in Thun­der­dome, things you’d think they ought to learn and that you know they aren’t learn­ing. The prece­dent for the abuse of power in times of cri­sis. This is my com­mu­nity ser­vice, and I’ll be es­corted off the grounds for it.

I’ve been read­ing up on turnips be­cause you can grow them in the mid­dle of win­ter when there’s snow on the ground if you re­ally have to. Recipes for dan­de­lion soup; which mush­rooms won’t kill you or make you freak out. I’ve been buy­ing up hand tools at garage sales; I’ve been hedg­ing against the fu­ture.

I will be Mel Gib­son in the Road War­rior. I will not be Mel Gib­son in real life. I will be Sell­ers in Strangelove. I am Dr. Emanuel Bron­ner in Chicago in 1947. I am Howard Beale, res­ur­rected for an­other sea­son, come to make my wit­ness. The cur­rency will be blood, meted out in plas­tic shop­ping bags with ‘THANK YOU’ printed on the side.

Eric Ehrn­schwen­der