Prophetic Outlook

By Ernest Hilbert b. 1970 Ernest Hilbert

Crooks run the whole world, and the Dow just fell.

Crap rules the airwaves. All your best plans stall.

The air is dirty, and you don’t feel well.

Your wife won’t listen. Friends no longer call.

Sad songs from youth no longer cast a spell.

Cancer research has run into a wall.

Some inflated hack just won the Nobel.

You witness clear signs of decline and fall.

The neighbors are cold, and your house won’t sell.

Your cat has bad teeth. Your paychecks feel small.

Maybe you’re really sick. It’s hard to tell.

Up ahead, traffic has slowed to a crawl.

The world didn’t just start going to hell.

You just noticed for the first time, that’s all.

Source: Sixty Sonnets (Red Hen Press, 2009)

Biography

Born in Philadelphia and raised in southern New Jersey, poet, critic, and editor Ernest Hilbert received a BA from Rutgers University and a PhD in English literature from St. Catherine’s College of Oxford University, where he studied with James Fenton and Jon Stallworthy.

In his debut collection, Sixty Sonnets (2009), Hilbert establishes a variation on the sonnet form, employing an intricate rhyme scheme and varied line . . .

Continue reading this biography