Impala

Muscle and sinew,

exposed and disoriented,

and mourning breeze

escaping cracked lips,

once chapped, now

cleft in inequal

quantities: time seeps

from sluiced openings

in waning heartbeats.

Halitosis, from coffees

and drams and

evenings of self-medication,

surrenders to numbed,

cupric breaths and

a warm slug,

which once used

to taste of

coffees and drams

and self-medicated evenings.

Another weak mourning

breeze escapes him,

and the red

slug slithers out

upon a wave

of blacker red.

He senses it

hit his lap,

and then disappear

into the footwell

of his Impala.