Watchers
They knew, but they preferred to do
nothing other than watching until they
became the reckless watchers of the planet,
buying, selling, owning, using, feasting with hungry
mouths, with hungry hearts that loved only consuming
everything the earth offered them gently, generously whilst
it turned into an anaemic dot whirling alone in darkness
while the sky was gasping, the animals disappearing,
the trees vanishing, the rivers evanescing, the corals
fading, the glaciers melting, and the watchers
watching, watching, watching while
the world was falling.
Özge Lena is a writer and poet based in Istanbul who has a published novella titled Otopsi. Her poems have appeared in Ink Sweat & Tears, Green Ink Poetry, Red Ogre Review, Harana, Acropolis Journal, The Phare, After Poetry, and elsewhere, and are also forthcoming in iamb. Her poetry was shortlisted for the Ralph Angel Poetry Prize 2021 and her poem “Summerlepsy” was shortlisted for The Oxford Brookes International Poetry Competition in 2021.