Drought

Drought

Dust rises from the tramping feet

Of skinny cattle moving along the track

Between brown and empty fields

Where the earth, dried and caked

Cracked and baked

Solid in its crustiness

Lies parched beneath a burning sun

The crops lie burned and beaten

Defeated by the dryness

Wispy roots withered

Lifeless, straw-like stretchings

Down between the cracks

Of powdered soil

Exhausted by the struggle to survive

Shrivelled and stunted

In the cratered furrows

The ground cries out for moisture

Any drops to slake and quench its thirst

Its desiccated loamy texture

Crumbling in the empty air

Turning into shifting dust

Drifting slowly into piles

Driven by an arid wind

Which whispers as it blows

The glaring, cloudless sky

Fierce and rain-barren

Curses and punishes

Withholds the water from the needy

Any liquid long receded, unreachable

Deep beneath the surface

Leaving not a thing alive

The landscape sterile

Condemned to a gasping, choking death

In the over-heated breeze

Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2014