we see the water keep right on rising and we know what it means but we thrill anyway. we anticipate the day the roadway is submerged. we want to be here. it begins with awareness of death. the desire to numb, the desire to mitigate, the desire to feel. to balance or enhance or end. in the awareness of death. why would one want to leave the natural world? it has grown cruel, unnatural. the water is rising, the weather will take us, disease will take us, war will take us, starvation will take us. and to the left ones nature will provide peace and forgiveness and resilience, for in the natural world cruel extraction kills and prudent providence lives.