ASHES ON THE INSIDE

The heat has beaten me,
I am ashes on the inside,
blood boiled like a Lafayette crawfish.

This is how the dinosaurs died,
it wasn't the ice, it was the fire,
the world began burning
and didn't stop for a thousand years.

Fossils aren't petrified bones,
they are imprints kiln fired into the earth,
that's how they will find me,
resting in a grave of soot,
melted into the dirt.

I see images of flames
dancing around the trees,
where we sat near the oaks and cedars.

Those strong silhouettes stood shadowed
beneath a ballet of stars in the evening sky,
diamonds dancing at midnight.

In the quiet nothing we talked, drank, loved,
our legs dangled from the river's edge,
moon's eyes adrift on the water.

Now red and umber reflect from the hills,
charcoal enshrouded earth.

How quickly it all crumbles.



About Carly Bryson:
Carly Bryson lives in Houston, Texas and writes poetry and prose about cracked dirt, the desert, lonesome highways, dirty rotten wars, nasty city air, pending dystopia and the frailty of the human condition.  Her work has appeared in Red Fez, Carcinogenic Poetry, Calliope Nerve and several anthologies. Her poetry collection Bandana Wasteland was recently published by NeoPoiesis Press.