When the world ends, I think the thermometer will read 45 degrees. I don’t imagine lava eddying with 7-11 debris aflame, the sun any closer. No, I imagine a panel of bewildered American Idol judges, then television fizzling forever. Only, we’ll have to trudge around in gray daytime and gray-black nights that will, for many weeks, offer quiet impenetrable as gray-black. The temperature: 45. Which fits, since it’s the opposite of the opposite, it’s the lower end of the opposite of the opposite, to be technical. The skies will stall. The oceans will stall, if “stall” equates with concentric decline. To be technical, “stall” equates with concentric decline. If the thermometer read “40” I’d question the finality of the catastrophe and if the thermometer read “50” I’d question the finality of the catastrophe. What do you think? When the world ends, I think the temperature will be 45 degrees. At first, we’ll be standing in circles, in the parking lot, as for a fire drill. We, shivering in coats, will be looking back toward a structure we can no longer inhabit.
