Draped in black she walks across desert sands
Sun hanging high
The air rippling from the heat.
She trails footprints that disappear in time
As the winds push Saharan grains
That carpet the far and beyond.
Searching for water she taps and stabs
ground with her spear of hoary worth.
Deep until the Earth bleeds
Clear,
Giving up its blood to the woman in shadow.
And she drinks.
Quenching the thirst of a throat dried and cracked
crawling towards the cut in the ground
the decayed,
the emaciated,
the carcasses of the land
struggled and strained to the oasis of life.
As the shadow stands and watched
thirsty no more.
She waits until they all approach for a drink.
And as skeletal remains part lips burned and blistered
for a drink,
to taste the nectar of nature's cool essence,
the woman withdraws her spear
licking its tip of its last drop.
Tauntingly swallowing life's most precious elixir.
And it is all gone.
Washed away into the vastness of the desert.
Only to become a mirage of happiness,
a silhouette of life
which gathered the scorched remains of the land
in a perfect circle.
This I write with scroll and pen.
The Drink by Shazza Nakim
Copyright © by Peace of Mind Publishings and with permission by Shazza Nakim
