The Serpent’s Meat
“…and dust shall be the serpent’s meat…”
Isaiah 65:25

An expanse broken only
by the small wooden house
with a chimney

and surrounded by
a reddish thick soupy dust
clogging the air and dampening
the senses:

seeping in the cracks in the wood on the walls,
flavoring our cereal in the morning and
musty kisses exchanged under a creaking ceiling fan at night.

Waking, we find a dusty film and salt flats
weighting our faces and bodies-
wherever the sticky-sweet was leftover

from the night before
when our bodies had arched; hip-bone mountain ranges
rising and falling while
the sun rose and set, scorching every minute
into nothing, and yet

there is something.

There is something
about the dust sparkling on the ends
of your eyelashes, the way it
mixes on my tongue
I spread your thighs,
and I come
away mud-faced,
and you come
away panting.

The dust, mixed with your wetness,
red like war paint-
evidence of my conquering
the landscape,

        which is your body.

The valley which rests between the hills
nestled against the expanse of the desert, all
leading to the muddy forest
which is buried between the crevices.

The salt of your earth,
I cannot escape it.