onyx fondles the yellow hem of a skirt of sunlight
without tarnishing its reputation for unbridled darkness.
scattered amid a herd of tumbleweeds
as iron as the sky… and the odd tortoise, rehearsing
a ballad, for to soothe the odd savage jackal.
as mad things call.

a storm approaches maximum sloth, as the sun beats the clock.
as the sun beats the arid scape with sour hammers, teaching vultures
the gospel of desolation and the effluvium of dead still.
the heat rising to meet the impending rain
is a vengeance and a frenzied vole.
and the hour of our thirst is unconquered
in the shadow of a Black Mesa,
with a Red Name.