He wakes up with his mouth dry, and every bone aches -
beneath a blood, blood red sky, dark sun careening in its wake -
and he swallows, and he tries, and stands on shaky ground
and wonders what it was worth
to be the Last Man on Earth.

There's cotton on his tongue and a strangling in his throat;
he walks to some beat gone unsung and pulls close on his coat.
Setting sun, flaming dreams, crashing from down on high,
he hobbles, shuffles to the west,
ignores the nothing in his chest.

Empty streets full to burst with echoes of the past,
he holds in hunger, works through thirst, to fly tattered rags half-mast -
Everyone gone and no one left but him to sit and sigh,
and gnaw and chew the gritty bones
one more tasteless meal taken alone.

The days pass and weeks go by; it gets harder and harder to endure,
and he starts to wonder why he tries, what it is he wants to ensure.
No legacy to save – preserve – no one to tell it to,
he'll soon be naught but dessicated hands
reaching, reaching for devastated lands.

And he lays down cold beneath the night, misses the starlight in the clouds -
too much quiet, not quite right – the silence without crowds.
Empty stomach, empty heart, nothing left to give,
yet took and took and took to fill,
but could not nourish dwindling will.

It starts and ends with them, he knows, and now he's all that's left;
stacking, piling gravestone rows, atoning his mortal theft.
Not brave enough to live, and yet too scared to die -
he wonders what it was worth
to be the Last Man on Earth.