Ancient Ocean

Every desert is haunted by the ghost of an ancient ocean,
phantom surf whispering over the salt remains of a dry ocean.

Invisible waves shatter against the crumbling sandstone reefs
that once reared their heads tall above a storm-tossed ocean.

The lime skeletons of tiny creatures tumble from the air
to be ground to dust by the passing of feet that forget the ocean.

Wind carves waterless ripples into endless expanses of dead sand,
builds dunes on unliving beaches that no longer frame an ocean.

Fossil shells peek from the gravel in dry washes and gullies
like scattered teeth in a shovel of soil from the grave of an ocean.

Over the flats in the distance, the air glitters with heat-mirage
reflections as brilliant as the water of a long-lost ocean.

In the dried mud of the lake-bed, encased in salt and sleeping
the eggs of brine shrimp await the certain coming of a new ocean.