Blue Raspberry Slurpee

The chaste desert scent

no longer reaches

my sun-cracked nose

just the putrid fetor of vomit,

camel droppings,

and half-digested couscous

scattered in the sand

awaiting the sirocco

to inter my human remains.

A dust devil inches past

bringing news from

the corners of this jarda,

of death, of plants

that no longer serve

as perches for birds,

and of tricks to play on living things

so the Sahara can again

cultivate its solitude

My sand-caked eyes,

wilted pink tongue,

and heat-poisoned brain

are just as selfish

just as bored

and just as entertained

by this childish mirage

as the camel I’m riding

Jimmy Hendrix his name

Set our course Jimmy, for

that desert 7-11

for a polar bear’s ass-cold

raspberry blue Slurpee

in a bottomless super big gulp cup

filled until it leaks

from the dome-shaped lid

like a burst artery pumping

frozen blue ambrosia

Stephen Rosenshein recently graduated from the George Washington University with a B.A. in Psychology.  He plans to spend the next two years travling in South America and teaching English.