A blinding desert sun and the sky like a looking glass, fractured.
Light streaming through the tops of Baobab trees
And red, sub-Saharan dirt kicked up
Like a dry mist.

There is a broad vista,
Some kind of savanna and
I am standing,
Face raised to the wind
Straining to see the horizon,
And in that quiet moment,
They come riding.

Atop the lumbering, gray bodies of Mastodons
They are dressed in cloths
Of red and orange and black.
There is an ancient, robed shepherd
Sitting astride a great, trudging beast,
And in his right hand
He holds a staff.
Solemnly, he pushes his behemoth mount on
Faster until the ground
Might split within the tremulous thunder of it.

And I must not run.
I hear a quiet voice urging me to walk on,
Walk out,
Walk up to it.
Face this thing.
And so, I do not cry out or hide
Or even step from one side to the other.

I walk a straight line
As swiftly the rider approaches,
Sand flying like fire,
And soon they tower above me,

But the eye,
The eye of the beast is kind, and it stops within inches of my face,
And peers down like some
Great, all-knowing thing.

Above him,
The rider leans sideways and extends the staff towards my neck.
Gently, there is a touch against my skin
And in that moment
There is a transference
An instance of knowing
Something given from Him.

I remember, it felt just like,
“Your soul is never alone”
And I fell to my knees with the relief of it.