C22

Your mouth is dry, your sweat evaporates and the rays of the sun pierce your skin
As you walk through this illusion of a forest the soil underneath your feet turns to sand
As you walk through this anhydrous place your eyes tell you that you are plagued with waterfalls
Your eyes tell you that you walk through a belligerent oasis
Your eyes tell you what your senses know it is not entirely true.

The vultures search for you
The vultures search for your children
The vultures search for your grandchild
They search

As you walk through this illusion of happiness
through this neon road
you can sense the darkness falling like a cloak
covering your eyes
so that you do not see the dagger of misapprehension.

I am your savior
Says the voice
I am the one to alleviate your thirst, to ease your pain from the knife in your ribs
I am the oasis in your desert

‘I am you savior, I can alleviate your thirst, heal your wounds’

The vultures’ death eager eyes search for you,
your children,
they eagerly search for your grandchild in the womb of the daughter
they eagerly search for the daughter in the womb of her mother

If only your pain never ends to feed their unending hunger.

And the deluded pilgrim asks when praying

For the pain to stop
For the vultures’ well being

In a paranoid dance macabre how can a god answer both?

(shh!
They search in the womb.)