When Pilgrim and the Spouse awake from bed
and step outside they're greeted by a ground
that's carpeted with verdant blades of grass,
the likes of which the two have never seen
within the Southern desert all their lives.
Nearby there is commotion, which they check
to find that almost all the village now
upon the morn is gather'd round one spot;
an alleyway in which the grass hath grown
so tall it towers over th'wooden huts 10
and seems, itself, to have a wooden skin
along its central shaft which makes its core,
around which needles green and much like grass
themselves are growing wide around the trunk
and narrowing atop the conifer
(for this is what they see but can not name
though trees of broader leaves our Pilgrim knows)
in cone-like fashion from its branching arms.
A larger man of stature reaches forth
to touch the tree, perceiving for himself 20
in disbelief at what his eyes present,
and when his fingers do caress the bark
to prove to him his eyes do not deceive
he jumps and clacks his heels speaking thus:
"It's wood! It truly is so marvellous!
A blessing from the Mother proving that
our culture is the properest of all,
and that our struggles have been worth our sweat."
At this our Pilgrim's stricken with a surge
that creeps along his spine and to his hip 30
where—taking what the Oracle bestow'd
to him those days ago fill'd with the spring's
abluting water—now he notices
the bottle weighs much lighter than it should;
uncapping lid to check th'interior,
his eye goes wide as tipping up the flask
he sees the water's gone, to which he says
to Spouse in whisper'd tone: "It must've leak'd
without our noticing, for all is gone
and this impossibility we see 40
is like to be th'result of magic drops
that seep'd into the earth to fertilize
the soil and create the life we see
in all its grandeur and its majesty."
To which the Spouse replies: "Then all is true
about the Owner's words of what the spring
is able to accomplish when applied
to earth; I had believ'd it all a lie
YOU ARE READING
As Ever Like the Sun & Moon at War
PoetryA troubled Pilgrim sets upon a road in search by sun and storm of paradise; a vain Pariah's banish'd from his home to render justice by the moonlit night: two individuals who share a flesh, each unalike in methods and beliefs, yet fated consequence...