Salt Flats at Low Sun

The crust holds your weight like a promise barely believed. Beneath it, water older than your name dreams of the sea it used to be.

You walk toward the mountains and the mountains walk away— a slow recession, the way grief works, always at the same distance.

The sky falls twice here: once above, once below, and you are the thin dark line the world folds along.

A bird crosses the white and leaves no shadow. You watch until you're not sure if you are watching or being watched by some older version of yourself.

At last the sun touches the rim. The flats go copper, then rust, then gone. You stay until the cold reminds you that you have a body, and the stars come out like salt.