Dust and Shadows

"In the desert, you can remember your name
'Cause there ain't no one for to give you no pain."
America, Horse With No Name, 

"The great depression is our lives."
Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club

I

I journeyed through a wasteland,
A place both parched and sere.
The denizens informed me,
"You'll find no solace here."

"This place has been forsaken,
Abandoned by the gods.
It's life has all been taken
And merged within the sod."

But I was quite resolved
And did not heed their tale.
I came to be absolved
Through hardship and travail.

Into the waste I set my course;
The light was at my back.
With much regret and much remorse
I sought the things I lack.

II

Behold the man!
He walks through the valley of shadow
And the shadow there is his own.
At dawn it stalks him.
At noon it strides beside him
And whispers darkness in his ear.
At evening it leads him, impatiently
Into night where imagination
Conjures the unimaginable.

III

Between the banks of the empty river,
The banks of the river all dry, the dust
From the arid bed of that ancient flow
Swirls in the breeze that blows down the channel.
Swirls in ochre billows above the bed
Of the ancient empty river that was.
No water within that ancient river;
The dead, dry river that flows here no more.
Nothing but dust now drifts downwind between
The banks of the empty river that was.
There may be a time when the banks are full,
When the water will ripple and surge again.
When the dust drowns muddy within the flood,
Carried away, far from these steep dry banks.
Never blown again; water bourne away
From the banks of the empty river course.
Today the banks of the river are dry,
And the dust--the dust! In ochre billows
Swirls in the breeze that flows in the channel
Of the ancient, empty river that was.

IV

Ants drag dry leaves over
Broken stone.  Ravens soar
In languid circles through
Canyons of broken stone.
Their dismal croaks echo
While the dry wind mutters
Through mouths of broken stone.
No hope can dwell within
This vale of empty oaths.

There are no trees.  The scrub
Claws the dry air.  The heat
Shimmers afar.  The wind
Blows hot, stifling, and yet
At night the stars glisten
Scintillant stones in sable
Illuminating my shadowed soul.

V

Cold blasts of air presage the storm
Sable pennants unfurl earthward
From towers of charcoal dripping
Inky streams adrift on grim gales.
Abruptly the chill rain begins
Waves from the sky breaking upon
This inland shore of broken stones.
Dry leaves drift in dribbles that feed
Rivulets riven in dry soil
Dissolving dust as water falls
To the banks of the empty river.
And the water ripples, surges
As the dust drowns muddy with flood.
And the banks of the river fill
With the water from heaven above.
Chill libation from heaven to
Earth.  The deluge that cleanses all,
Baptismal rain drowning dust from
Broken stones and broken souls.

VI

Behold the man!
He walks from the valley of shadow
And the shadow there is his own.
At dawn it flees before him.
At noon he trods upon it
And heeds it not.
At evening it follows, obedient,
Into the night to vanish
In the lightless dark.

VII

I journeyed through this wasteland,
A place both parched and sere.
I journeyed long to be absolved
But found no pardon here.

This place has been forsaken,
Abandoned by the gods.
Yet in its grim severity
It left me over-awed.

And I emerged from out that waste
The light now to my fore.
And I am still the man I was,
No wiser than before.