Beneath pristine packs of southern snow
Echoes of a violent past lay scattered;
Lost amongst the landscape like fragments
Of half-remembered, ancient dreams,
These imprints of impossible ferocity
Permeate the permafrost with their
Sparse, unnatural presence.

Carefully              we              sieve                    the
Frozen              dust,          shaking      out
Terrestrial                         impurities
To catch these tiny
Specks

Of interstellar intolerance.

Blushing beneath the sudden
Light from a brash and unfamiliar star
These tiny ferrous needles fall from
Frigid haystacks –
Their secrets undressed beneath our
Cool and unrelenting gaze;
Peeling back their aged, translucent skin
To reveal their buried ancestry:
A cast off from the cloud of
Lost and broken stars that
We unwittingly call home.
The German Kohnen Station in