Nieuw Holland

Fields of megafauna, legends in our eyes.
Beneath a confected dune, I spilled some
water from a glass jar and watched as it
disappeared into yesterday. We pitched a
tent on the beach, listened to the dingo
howls, and prayed for rescue. The locals
don’t seem to mind us being here, though
we are invisible to them, of their past.
The animals’ eyes glow softly in amber,
rare mosquitoes frozen in space. As time
washes our shorelines away, we struggle
with this eternal fear of obsolescence.
We’ll never know what it was like before
we arrived; and they, after we have gone.