We'd grown immune
To the acid,
To the searing heat.

The genes
Of volcanic protozoans
Evolved us

Over ten generations
From hairless weak humans
From a devastated Earth

To fire creatures thriving
On the metallic mountains
Of Venus.

I stand with my daughter
On Maxwell Montes, overlooking
The saffron plains below.

Virga falls,
Nourishing our galenic plants
And cyclo-octasulphuric fauna.

She asks, what is that blue orb
Beyond the haze of darkness
Between us and the universe?

She knows this
But I remind her anyway.
There is so much to remember,

We often forget.
That is Earth, I tell her,
Where the first of us came from,

Escaping the world they destroyed
Through selfishness and greed,
Unable to agree as one species,

But instead,
Battling each other
Till the planet was lost.

Our ancestors swore
We would not make
The same mistakes twice.

So we evolved ourselves,
This time not only
To survive the harsh land,

But constructing for all of us,
A pure mind.
A hive mind.