We Are in the Age of

The snake eating its tail,
untying Gordian knots
w/chatbots
as my brain rots,
late to the party
right on time to pay extra
I’m an American NPC
w/23 canned responses. Exactly
enough to deflect,
these chains of failed dreams. And yet

I’m happier, stronger,
and more hopeful
than ever.
I’m in my dreambig era,
and while life is but a nonconsensual simulation
bookended by silence,
it’s a damn good one.

When I Was Young

I was raised on the axis
of hope and promise:
North Coast California
year 2000
interregnum—
before the
empire
bared its teeth
in the mirror
and the dot com
went mushroom.

On the last day of school
we camped
at Heart’s Desire Beach
building cities in the sand
and walking on Mars.
Forecast:
fog clearing, endless
in the golden hour
riding the Pacific plate
fault lines
slipping
smooth.

When I Grew Up

My first boss
was a Sufi mystic
biochemist, plastic surgeon.
Thru ecstatic glass
he glimpsed paradise
in a cesspool
humanity a hurricane
of yellow-green lightning
raindrops with legs
praying for wings.
In a basement,
I ghostwrote
his theory of everything.
He limped to my desk
said I love you
and fired me
the next day.

I respawned
at Google
as a gilded gear
beside a man
who spun too slow
on his swivel chair.
He dropped from his contract
onto the streets
his safety net
a stairwell
swatting at mama flies
in the silicon desert
as her babies nursed
on his wounded leg.

Rob and Behzad
still visit me in vapor
whispering of a cyclone’s eye.
Shall we all sprout rotors
and transcend!
Or rain down—
locust fallen
in a kindly sigh.






Trevor Cohen is an author, storyteller, and creative organizer. He published a book on solutions to climate change, writes fiction and poetry about finding magic in the mundane, and hosts events to harness collective creativity. He created Day of the ___ Writer, where 150 writers opened windows into their creative worlds, and organizes the Spill Your Dreams writing collective.

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