Desert

Scorching heat during the day, under the sun. Everything burns in waves of bright light. Even the tiniest drop of sweat sizzles and dies. You can’t even cry, for tears die before they even have the chance to roll on your face. Can’t keep your eyes open, for the light itself burns like hot spikes of fiery steel embedded in your brain. You can’t stop, you can’t lay on the ground no matter how tired you are, for if you do the hot sand would make the little blood left in you boil. All you can do is desperately hope for a bit of shade, for a cool breeze.

And just when you think it’s all over night comes. The shade you so hoped for comes as pitch black darkness that the stars, no matter how many, can’t even hope to tear apart. The cool breeze you so wished for is a freezing madness that rips your lungs apart with every gasping breath. And again you can’t cry for any tear would froze into icy needles that scratch deep in your eyes. You would drop down, but then the cold sand would freeze the little warmth your heart still carries.

So you walk aimlessly, day and night, with painful steps that burn or freeze your soles, with eyes that don’t see anything anymore. A whirlwind of pain, a mindless torture, silently screaming for absolution. You feel the sand and remember how it came to existence. Torrid heat, freezing cold, scorching light, chilling darkness. The strongest of granite is torn to pieces, smaller and smaller, until only dust remains. The same dust that sometimes rip apart your flesh in the storms that are making sure you will crumble no matter what. All turn to dust. So will that empty, soulless husk you still happen to be. In the end no one will be able to tell the difference. One grain of sand or another. Was it granite, was it bone? Is this what remained of a rock, or someone’s hopes and dreams?

Who cares?

It’s nothing but dust, for nothing survives here but the dust. It’s the desert we call life. Deadly, but god it looks good in the pictures…

Nadir, June 15, 2011