The Asphalt's Breath

The asphalt exhales a dusty ghost, a grey lung suddenly filled with iron and the sharp, cool scent of secrets long buried under the static of noon.

Each drop is a percussionist striking the slate of the sidewalk, waking the stones from their fever-dream where the heat had turned the horizon to water.

Rivers of silver carve maps in the grit, brief geographies that vanish in gutters, carrying the weight of the afternoon's silence into the dark, rhythmic heart of the storm.