Frontier Life
A rocket launched from a pad on earth,
a robot to roam in place of our feet,
the journey resembles a trip out west
to massive, bloody, Arizona rocks
dotting the horizon of burnt soil
once part of abandoned shrines.
What will this mechanical rover
discover in million year old rubble?
Amino acids, the building block,
complex proteins, remnants of water,
soil once teeming with life
now parched by a cold desert?
Few men or women will live to see
the secrets of a planet unfold
until we send those of our own
to stand, touch, smell, and hear
in their own minds an alien land.
And soon, once the rocks are mined
for chemical riches, others will follow,
build pueblos like our native people,
restore canals to their former glory,
praise the sun even in painful cold.