desert throat

for vocalist Urna Chahar-Tugchi
urna sculpts a thousand horses of dust, wind
flayed ribs
naked on the steppes, unutterable lullaby
to the gale, a tempest flower.
she keens for the lonely arc we leave
our little ones,
desert wails for the breach of each birth:
desecrated silence.
bless me with your wept howl
molting foal, mare shying from the bit.
incant sand
to rain the clarity of your cry
tenseless
incessant

Vikas Menon
“desert throat” first appeared in MiPOesias (Winter 2007).