In the endless cycle of birth, life, death and rebirth, the evolving celebration that is the soul of this planet, there is a vital role for death. Death is the transition, the movement of material and energy from living beings to the fertilizer for renewed life.
But what happens if death itself is eliminated? What happens is that the cycle of life is broken and ceases to be. This may be the fate of the Gulf if not the planet.
Speech of the Figure of Final Death
I am the other Death
Behold, I am the Death of Worlds,
I am the Death of Death.
I am the stopping of the Wheel of Life,
I am the denial of all rebirth.
I am the fixation of the carbon into lifeless plastic and polymers.
I am the toxin that breaks the chain,
Of plant, animal, predator and prey.
I am the clearcut hillside where the eagle weeps,
And the Earth pours her tears,
As mud to the sea.
I am the driftnet that sweeps the seas
Of teaming life; that hears not the dolphin's cry.
I am the petroleum ooze that poisons the seas,
The radiating waste that lurks in the soil –
Silent and killing over centuries.
In vain do the leaves rot to loam and
The bodies of animals return to the Earth.
I will block their return to the Mother's joyous feast.
And I will do it with the means you have placed in my hand.
When the web of life is torn, there is only I,
And the cold darkness of my pitiless maw,
That ever waits outside the round of life.
I am the Death of Worlds.
I am the Death of Death.