Bleak winds scour empty wastes
where dust devils spin insanely
along bone-dry creek beds.
Above in featureless skies
a blind sun hides behind
a cataract of thin, high cloud.

On the flanks of a long-dead volcano
a flock of small, red finches
takes to the air like a noxious gas.
Small hardy flowers have found a home here,
attracting iridescent insects
that flit like ancient sparks.

And in a shadowed cleft of rock,
hidden from those who would hunt,
a mother guards her mewling cub.
Dark stripes mark tan, lithe flanks
as ever-alert eyes glitter,
hard as the blackest of lava.

Were she capable of mockery,
she might howl in triumph
at those who believe her extinct.
Yet for the present she awaits Mankind’s destruction,
knowing then that the thylacine
will reclaim their ancestral lands.