Whiteout

It thrusts into your chest, leaching the marrow from your ribs. Fingers chapped and scratching in a deathly chill. Your heartbeats become a platitude of pain. The melting ice streams out your eyes, tasting of salt and decay.

There on your blue-light screen: human/monster waste in an ugly replacement iceberg.

(And there: dirtied water.

And there: habitat wreckage, animal homes moribund.)

You put on your mittens, touch-screen of course, and continue scrolling.

You push it to the sharp edge of your mind, where the deceased revolve in slow orbit. Then, you can continue pretending through the sudden squall of hail. So the only thing keeping you up at night is the heatwave making you sweat upon your covers.

It’s frail/flaccid/feeble but

the sunlight-cracked surface forces sightlessness.

Sea ice creeping into the crevices of your eyes.

Your eyes fog over, the dense blizzard, the pure white, easier to see.