“In years to come, will they remember with nostalgia what must seem even now like a magnificent chorus of birdsong pouring down from the trees? Are we all, generation upon generation, destined to mourn what seems in this moment impossibly abundant but is already far on its way to being gone? The world will always be beautiful to those who look for beauty. Throats will always catch when the fleeing clouds part fleetingly and the golden moon flashes into existence and then winks out again. Tears will always spring up at the wood thrush singing through the echoing trees, at the wild geese crying as they fly. A soul touched by the scent of turned soil or sun-warmed grass, a spirit moved by crickets singing in the grass, will spend a lifetime surrounded by wonder even as songbirds drop one by one from the poisoned sky and crickets fall silent in the poisoned grass. Apocalyptic stories always get the apocalypse wrong. The tragedy is not the failed world's barren ugliness. The tragedy is its clinging beauty even as it fails. Until the very last cricket falls silent, the beauty besotted will find a reason to love the world.”