In early Djilba

     in spring sunlight
     the silver lizard’s
     ancient skin

The skink is five million years old
Chasing a three-hundred-million-year-old bug
it runs under the raised base of a steel post
The iron is as old as Earth
The fence: two winters

The skink emerges, scampers, pauses
Filtering the rain of wavelengths
its scaly integument glistens,
passes heat into blood

It’s day one of Spring
in early Djilba
On the post’s hard body
at the edge of a weld
rust shoves aside grey paint