Eschatology

Troy Wong

I’ve seen what comes next. There is nothing white,

clean, or pure; no stolen land spared from the flood

only a tricolour sky bursting with birds of paradise

blocks of deconsecrated skyscrapers choked by vines

and warehouses devoid of industry, hollowed

as the husks of gutted durians. Here, congresses

of orangutans convene in the empty stairwells.

The muggy air thrums with jewelled dragonflies

and crested monkeys loose their cries from far off.

Free at last, we glow, a dozen roseus dusks refracting

through a city-broad smog blanket. Eternities of stars

swirl in our eyes, pre-colonial, blacker than the

Jurong night. We liondance, faces aflame, silver-

maned, dog-noble, we storm, form our parliaments

of thunder; we spit, firecrackers splitting on concrete.

The offender has been removed. The neighbourhoods

gather stormwater into a belt of ambered mirrors.

In them, our reflections: limitless as children running

barefoot in new clothes through vacant streets.

TROY WONG is an Australian poet. His work is published or forthcoming in Antipodes, Australian Poetry Journal, Cordite, Griffith Review, Island and more. He was shortlisted in the 2026 Gwen Harwood Poetry Prize. His debut collection, Three Durians, is forthcoming from Cordite in 2026.