Cup of earth 13/08/03

We followed

tracks a hundred
jeep-deep,

an outline of shark-teeth, down to the
belly

of a great bowl of wildlife

a
retirement home for bull
elephants

But there's more to
it

more to the blood shimmer of moons and
capes

by herds and hyena
eyes

something the buffalo skulls hint
at

This pool: a museum, a chest of
relics,

An experiment in
taxidermy,

yes, where the plants bordering the
tracks

are like spined, stuffed
dragons

posed in mid-spring,

their
scales caked in the thick, red dust

of the
road.

The galaxies of dried blood
dust

The creeping iron oxide
dust

reaching over
everything,

making the land around as a great, ageing
machine

An engine of nature, choked and
stopped

blown and worn to an arthritic
clench,

a dirge, a dying
groan

And at the high rim, where
the forest

is a bulging moss, clouds
ride

over the edge and climb
down,

like the white dust-tail of a
charging

saracen army, ghosts of the
first

steely rain of civilisation