We step out beneath two suns
that no longer belong to memory.
For years we saw them on screens,
studied their spectra,
calculated mass and orbit.
Now they burn against the curved glass
of our respirator lenses,
one amber and heavy,
the other white and sharp.
Thin clouds stretch across the sky,
pulled long by heated wind.
Far over the plain,
other landing pods cross the
light in controlled descent:
brief silver arcs, then gone.
Thruster flare fades to vapor.
The sky closes over their fall.
Respirator seals lock at jaw and cheek.
Spore filters hum.
We take the first measured breath.
Mineral salt. Resin.
Iron warming in open suns.
The ground releases its chemistry.
Crystal grit shifts under our boots,
fracturing both suns into narrow bands.
Each step sends brief rainbows through the sand.
Blue-ribbed stems rise from the soil,
fluid moving visibly inside them.
Not decorative.
Working.
The entire plain is working.
Heat thickens distance.
We know the mathematics of refraction.
We know dense air bends a line.
Still, the horizon lifts and settles
in slow vertical bands,
heated layers stacking,
then thinning again.
Inversion.
Physics.
And yet it feels alive.
Warm currents rise in sheets.
Dust lifts, hovers, falls.
Twin shadows form beneath us
and divide when we shift.
Light splits edges.
Color separates at the rim of sight.
Breath steady inside the mask.
Heart steady.
For now.
