The Interchange

“It looks like the human race is finally coming to an end!”
the rat said to his friend, who responded, “What makes you think so!?
The smartest of us have predicted this for thousands of years,
and it still hasn’t happened!”

“Well, just look at what’s going on!” the first rat answered.
“War, disease, famine, drought, murder, suicide, and mayhem
wherever one looks. I have to believe that it’s never been this bad!”

“You need to read more human history!” the second rat replied.
“It’s always been like this. And, in fact, there have been periods
when it’s been much, much worse. . .”

Jeffrey Zable is a teacher, conga drummer/percussionist who plays
for dance classes and rumbas around the San Francisco Bay Area,
and a writer of poetry, flash-fiction, and non-fiction. He's published
five chapbooks, and his writing has appeared in hundreds of literary
magazines and anthologies, more recently in Exquisite Death, Ranger,
New English Review, The Raven's Perch, Corvus, and many others. . .