Behold, I make all things new. –Revelation 21:5
One day the last F-150 will sputter to a stop. The last fluorescent tube light in the last Wal-Mart will flicker off, casting the last aisle of spark plugs into darkness, and that will be that for trucks. The last gas pump will then sit idle, the pavement will turn to weeds and moss, and the last road there will overgrow with underbrush until the double yellow line is covered over with limbs knocked down in a storm. The last rebar in the last support column will rust out, the last graffiti will crumble from the face of the last overpass, and JJ won’t heart Kayla anymore.
One day the last library will sink into mold. The last encyclopedias will plunge through the floor into the last archived periodicals, scattering the last special collections. The last books about psychotherapy, medieval Chinese metallurgy, and the poems of Hafiz will heap together on the last thin carpet. The wood of the last study carrel will begin to delaminate, its fragments splaying out, and the last dedication page thanking the last supportive and patient spouse and editor will be chewed off to line the nests of squirrels.
One day the last bunker will collapse, and the taproots of walnuts and white oaks will snake down and through to make a space for moving rainwater. The last missile silo will slouch into a shallow depression in an unremarkable prairie. The last landing strip will be claimed by sagebrush, and the last air traffic control tower will become a rookery for crows. Hives of honeybees will stuff the wheel wells and turrets of armored personnel carriers, and ants will carve hollows under the treads. Specialized bacteria will evolve to feast on the iron, and chipmunks will make off with the MREs.
One day the last ski lift will be blown off the mountain on an especially windy day, and a river will wash the last stones of the last temple out into its delta. The last rooftop bar will tumble from the top of the last hotel onto the last downtown street, the cocktail glasses will shatter, and the shards will be carried off by stormwater. The last strings will pop off the last guitar as its wood twists in the rain, and for a half a moment it will sound a desperate and muffled E-flat. The carrion birds will startle at the sound, and then they will continue with their meals.
One day the last iPad will be ground to dust under glaciers. The last data on the last hard drive will corrupt, and the last ones and zeroes will leach out into the soil. The last photos stored in the last cloud will vanish, but no one will notice because the last network will be down. The last camera will try in vain to surveil a face, before a surging continental plate folds it under a rising ridge. Bears will jump the turnstiles to make their winter dens in the last short line of subway cars. The foundations of the last sweatshop will be weathered down to gravel by wind and rain, and the last Amazon warehouse will spill countless pairs of underwear, still wrapped in plastic, out into tall grass.
One day the last remaining floors of the last high-rise elevator shaft will sink under the waves and be covered by urchins. The last Keurig machine will bob to the top, float for a moment, and sink again, coming to rest against the shell of a fire hydrant. The last receipt will wave ghostly under the water until it disintegrates and is conveyed on the current. An octopus will overturn the last cooking pot, looking for shrimp, and then make the pot its home. The last diaper will swell until it bursts, and the last polymer spheres bloom out and are eaten by unsuspecting fish. The last footbridge will loosen at one side and swing in the current for a few weeks, until it breaks away and tumbles out of sight. Polaris will still shine in the northern sky, witnessed by the sawgrass and the seaweed.
One day sands will cover over oceans and rains will beat against mountains until they wash downstream as sand again. One day the worms will wake unperturbed by any plow or backhoe, the raccoons and turtles will cross wherever they like, and the waterbirds and mushrooms will have their age. One day the ice caps will melt and freeze and melt again, moving water up and down the shores of continents like knees in a bathtub, and 500-year weather events will happen on whatever schedule suits them. One day a tree will fall in the forest and everyone will hear, and in the sound of it all will be made new.