Bouncing through thin atmosphere

on independence day.

A tiny human probe is steered

from million miles away.

A rover rolls on rosy world.

Finding a path through Ares Vallis.

Solar petals of craft unfurled.

To power a Martian palace.

Romping through this alien vale,

the robot's stay is brief.

Rocks it finds will tell a tale

of aeons past, in close relief.

That flood plain of a liquid place

is now as dry as dust.

But was there life? A microbe race.

In soil as red as rust.