For five long years I’ve walked with you;
Slogged through dunes of corpse-dry dust;
Rushed at a snail’s pace through wastelands of rust-
Red rocks and boulders split in two by Barsoom’s
Frigid air; stared up at skies turned cinnamon
Hues by talcum powder clouds, and all the while the only sound
The gentle purring-whirring of your gears
And the crunching-scrunching of your wheels
Across and through the crusted ground…
Together we’ve seen wondrous sights stolen from my dreams:
Earth reduced to a mere pinprick of light,
Lost in a Bierstadt sunset painted lavender and blue;
Ares’ famous pair of jewel-bright moons skating ‘cross
The sky while shy shooting stars dropped
Silently to the sea of shattered stones below;
Dust devils waltzing to the whispered music of the wind
Before fading away, the ghosts of Mars That Was…
But you are struggling now, I feel it.
I feel the waves of weariness breaking o’er you
As you steal another precious sol of life just as I
Feel the dead weight of half a decade’s fallen dirt upon you,
But I can only shake my head helplessly as you fight
To stay alive to feed on the warmth of another amber dawn.
If I could I would send a cup of cool Cumbrian rain
To clean your dusty backs; kneel down next
To you to wipe the grime from your travel-tired eyes
And help you see clearly again.
You long for the peace of well-earned sleep, I know,
And no-one walking by your side would blame you if you chose
To sigh “Enough, my work is done!” and stopped roving
At the next sunrise. But do not leave us yet;
there are more wonders to behold, and although one cold,
Cruel day your lives will surely end, while a flame
Of life still flickers in your hearts you must press on,
Proof of what Man, when challenged, can do.
© Stuart Atkinson 2009
Astropoetry 