In serpentine confusion
the road winds from the sea,
through forests green
and fields unseen,
past wastelands bare
that reeked despair,
down toward a fallow lea.
Beyond the lea a harsh wind blew,
a hot and bitter breath,
that dried the land
to bitter sand,
and promised only death.
Into the dunes the roadway ran,
into the desert's biting sands,
which scoured flesh
and burnished hands,
annihilating any trace
of footprints from my desperate race.
It's on this path I journey forth,
to reach that place beyond regret,
where sins and sadness go to die,
and men go to forget.
I travel on through grit-thick gales,
near blind and caked with sand,
until at last the trail just ends
deep in this desert land.
There is no path that guides me now,
no stars that I can see,
and as I fall from weariness,
made raw from grinding blasts,
my mind goes dark
and pain subsides,
for I am free at last.