Suffocating Salamanders

Your translucent skin

Gasps gently for breath

In the Land of the Noonday Sun;

A mountainous vista

Unexpectedly replaced

With Ziploc bags and

Moist paper towels

As you travel to

Transparent incubators

To be fed a diet of

Crickets,

Humidity,

And rising temperatures.

Beneath a harsh and

Artificial sun

Thermal cues subliminally shift

Subdermal networks

To rebuild broken vessels,

Replenishing moisture

That breathes new life

Into your acclimatised

Enclosure.

Genetic sampling begins

To unpeel the

Secrets of your

Self-sacrifice,

Revealing the limitations

Of your plasticity in the

Blistering face

Of warming skies.

This complex sequencing

Extracting a simple truth:

That if we cannot regenerate

A way of living then

We will surely suffocate;

Hung in the heat

Like withered husks

Of fragile skin.