My dear friend, I know, In the desert, we have been friends. Under the burden of the sun, in such sweltering design, The chorus of reason has failed to reach us. We have seen each other look for the same spot, The exact same place. Where neither the searing heat Of the storms, nor a hundred dunes can still our voices. Where your love for your wife will forever resound in its perpetual longing To be, And where without heat or sand, there My voice will finally hold still. Is it not disappointing that in every question with even the slightest Tinge of profundity, the only answer that pleases The truth of our deepest insight is yes and no? The desert is unflinching in being barren, all the waters, Few and far between, Are only images of those which are not desert. You strike to spell love, but where will you keep it As to let it hide from the light of the sun and the howling of harrowing sand? My friend, It only piles up and up and up. And when it can no longer go up, pray tell, How does it feel to view the horizon and see only more desert, vast and infinite? How would it be like to look down and know That even now you are no safer?
(The line cuts in this poem have been affected by the formatting restrictions of the website--in particular, the limit on the number of characters a line may contain.)