Survive

Sun flames the tops

of leafless trees

and breeze absent 

so scalds even the stones.

Ground strained to drying 

blood, ruptured,

sky cloudless, music-less;

air pulses, waits.

Here, I cannot see a reflection

of my tawny, dust-dirt face, 

Martian, fixed to brace to still -

must stay still.

Salt-baked tears escape

for faults of circumstance

and time and place and 

unintended loss of will.

Crouched in vestiges of shade

with my rattlesnake 

who cheats me out of words,

life retreats,

grasp to last seeds of survival 

as motion drains,

there will be no revival

until it one day rains. 

Image from pixabay.