Toolbanks, datasets, dirty fingers and wretched toes
wafted up from the city stench, a miasma of putrid
rot, cantilevered over from a past so vile,
the ichor has coagulated into jelly.
We sat there, staring at the flotsam of
two hundred thousand years of filthy
humanity, drifting in from stuttering caves,
limitless for their puked offerings.
A 22-week old fetus, wrapped in oily rags
and burger paper, didn't have the lungs to
scream, much less mewl as it floated by,
a few short breaths from death and rendering.
"We like it this way," went the prayer
that was the sole unifier among those that
watched, a mantra for shuddering pestilence
that keeps us all cool.