New Babel
by Tim Babbitt
Oblivious monotony
A stairway built upon piled bodies
As humanity sullenly climbs the ladder
Reaching for morose paradise above
Angelic hill of stepping-stone corpses
Its zenith closer with each self-destructive stride
This cycle of sacrifice surely has great purpose
Blind desperation
A relentless struggle for self-inflicted needs
Machinations invented to bestow false value
The ants writhe in mud of their own making
God looks to New Babel with weary eyes
The cherubs silently wonder if the Maker is proud
After all, the ants were made in His image
Systematic vanity
The highest echelon living in steel utopia
Feeding off the rats that crawl below
An apparatus of one-sided necessity
The rats are paid in hope and freedom
Promises provide heat and fill their stomachs
Their revenue only matters if Zacchaeus get his cut
Manufactured purpose
The gathered mass of a corporate pantheon
Praising the brazen idols of materialism
Baptized in free enterprise as the offering plate is passed
The soon sweat away the miracle of youth
And the rats can finally retire in their broken bodies
All the while great men die without lifting a finger
Such a glorious framework this is
An agency who’s foundation is black with tar
And who’s spirit is nothing if not content
If a disruptive word brushes its holy hem
The syllables will be like a suicide note
Final words cast into the fire and forgotten
Thus the ants gaze upon the panorama of New Babel
While rats gather at its feet in glittering shackles
They watch as Eden is drip-painted in a discharge of plastic
And can’t help but recall the words of their Maker
“It was good.”
A stairway built upon piled bodies
As humanity sullenly climbs the ladder
Reaching for morose paradise above
Angelic hill of stepping-stone corpses
Its zenith closer with each self-destructive stride
This cycle of sacrifice surely has great purpose
Blind desperation
A relentless struggle for self-inflicted needs
Machinations invented to bestow false value
The ants writhe in mud of their own making
God looks to New Babel with weary eyes
The cherubs silently wonder if the Maker is proud
After all, the ants were made in His image
Systematic vanity
The highest echelon living in steel utopia
Feeding off the rats that crawl below
An apparatus of one-sided necessity
The rats are paid in hope and freedom
Promises provide heat and fill their stomachs
Their revenue only matters if Zacchaeus get his cut
Manufactured purpose
The gathered mass of a corporate pantheon
Praising the brazen idols of materialism
Baptized in free enterprise as the offering plate is passed
The soon sweat away the miracle of youth
And the rats can finally retire in their broken bodies
All the while great men die without lifting a finger
Such a glorious framework this is
An agency who’s foundation is black with tar
And who’s spirit is nothing if not content
If a disruptive word brushes its holy hem
The syllables will be like a suicide note
Final words cast into the fire and forgotten
Thus the ants gaze upon the panorama of New Babel
While rats gather at its feet in glittering shackles
They watch as Eden is drip-painted in a discharge of plastic
And can’t help but recall the words of their Maker
“It was good.”
Tim Babbitt is a 21-year-old writer currently serving in the US Air Force. During the 2020 pandemic, the unsettling tales of Lovecraft inspired him to put his own ideas to the pen. Since then, he has written two published dark fiction stories with Mishmashers Publishing. In his free time, Tim plays the bass guitar in a local band.