Tuesday, July 19, 2011

The Caravan of Those Who Have Turned Their Face to the Sun

I walk in the shadows, dear,
and I wear the mask we all wear:
a mask made of shadow and of starlight
a mask that hides my face
by showing it

covered in colors,
gold and red and black,
showing a mask
that transmutes the things of this world
into something we can comprehend,
and comprehending,
something we can despise.
And if we have faces, dear, they are faces so colorful,

with hues of the soul's spring and the spirit's fall,
that only a monster with teeth of crystal rose,
only a professor with terrible tweed skin,

only a warrior with sand for soul
could ever hope
to know us,

could ever hope to comprehend the weakness
that keeps us from turning our faces to the sun.

We walk in shadows, dear,
and when we look each other in the face

we cringe and turn away,

hoping to preserve some part of that old world,
the one where the sun through crystal leaves transmuted everything into sea foam, a green
and waving sea that we swam
one night
when your shining body fell into my embrace

one night when above us whispered the white wings
of one whose whispers saved us.

Take my hand, dear, and we'll
walk together in the shadows and we'll look
each other, blindly,
in the eye, until one day we do not sleep but are all changed,
until we
can look each other
in the eyes,
and join the caravan of those who have turned their faces to the sun.

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