Global warming is spreading their domains

(Category: Poetry) 

Global warming is spreading their domains

They are the deadliest animals of all.

Not really them but their cargo:

viruses, bacteria, worms.

They transmit a long list of diseases.

They are little, light, lethal.

An impressive weapon designed by nature:

flying syringes.

Mosquitoes have inhabited the land much earlier than us.

They attacked our ancestors,

the primates.

They are the scourge of the tropics.

Restrain only by the colder weather of temperate areas.

But global warming is rewriting the rules:

Mosquitoes are expanding,

venturing farther north and south.

One degree warmer spreads their dominions

thousands of kilometers.

They have two main armies:

Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus.

Their divisions are deployed in all continents,

only the cold Antarctica escapes.

The former, the most dangerous;

but the latter, better equipped to invade the new territories.

We have fought them for centuries:

Draining their ponds,

gassing our cities,

shielding ourselves with oils,

putting traps,

and plenty more.

We win a battle,

they call for retreat,

but they come back,

they will always come back.

We have developed vaccines,

and can create fifth columns into their ranks:

sterilized males that mate their females,

reducing the size of their battalions.

We have been ingenious,

but global warming is on their side.

The war will continue.

The great battle will take place this century.  

Either they will scourge the earth,

killing us by the millions,

or we may keep their numbers checked,

but they will always come back.

Pablo Rodas-Martini

Some of the science behind the poem: 

"The link between Zika and climate change," February 2016. 

"In Zika epidemic, a warming on climate change," February 2016. 

"We´re starting to understand just how Zika and climate change go together," August 2016.