There will come soft rains.

This is a lovely, haunting, humbling article from New Scientist magazine (link via kottke.org).

How long would it take the Earth to recover if humankind was to irrevocably, inexplicably vanish?

Imagine Earth Without People

A really amazing read as I spend my day traipsing around in the city.

On some deep down instinctual level I find that part of me longs for this to happen. Then, when i think about it more, I realize that I would want to be the omniscient eye that's watching it all occur, safe and sound, with my loved ones by my side, of course.

Obviously, this must follow.

There will come soft rains and the smell of the ground,
And swallows circling with their shimmering sound;

And frogs in the pools singing at night,
And wild plum trees in tremulous white;

Robins will wear their feathery fire,
Whistling their whims on a low fence-wire;

And not one will know of the war, not one
Will care at last when it is done.

Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree,
If mankind perished utterly;

And Spring herself, when she woke at dawn
Would scarcely know that we were gone.

- Sara Teasdale