White Desert Poem

Aidan, 6^th grade

An endless white desert glares under the noonday sun.  A lone cactus rises out of the sand, verdant against the unremarkable background.  In the distance, a mountain rises.  It breaks the skin of the desert, rising high into the sky.  A grey snake suns itself on a gray rock.  A scaly lizard crawls across the sand.  High above, hanging below the yellow sun, grey vultures circle.  One shrieks, letting loose an unearthly call that chills a patchy white owl.  The owl quickly retreats into its hole, one of many in the shifting sands.  A grey-black rabbit hops to and fro, scanning the ground for any signs of vegetation.  It spots a lone dirty shrub, and hops over to its dinner.  As its head descends to snatch up the plant, a falcon swoops down and grabs it in its talons.  The rabbit’s squeal echoes around the dusty plain.  A low rumbling fills the ears of all and sundry, a plane swoops low over the desert, its flashy colors shining brightly against the blue sky.  Night fall, a crescent moon rises over the sand.  A wash of pale light slowly slides across the sand, an owl hoots.  First one scorpion, then another, emerges from a thin crack in another white rock, until a flood of black bodies and scuttling hairy legs pours from the tiny crack.  A flurry of activity in this sun-bleached, arid, white wasteland, here at the median of the world.