The rain and the burning sun entwine;
and what becomes of water and fire
but spirit-lifting mists,
 vaporous and lovely,
rising like a host at the height of prayer.

True, it's cold now;
 but remember the heat
and how it slows and softens us.
We are blown into flame;
 bellowed and molded.

Oh! look at the moving stars;
 we spin on a tiny sphere
Fly in hurtling steel
Dive in ocean deeps
Drive at life-threatening speed.

We want it all, the comfort
and the notion that we will not pay.
Yet there'll be no resisting the day
when flesh greets rock
and we're brought to our gravelly knees
in a gritty embrace of the earth.

Tamara Jenkinson-Parish