sign

you spend your life wandering the outback.
everything is sand and rock,
scrub-brush, blistering sun by day,
the emptiness of freezing cold by night.

at a cross-roads -
tracks crossing another set of tracks -
you find a sign-post hedgehog full of crooked arrows:
paris, this way,
new york, that way,
brisbane, another way altogether.

who painted these names, these mile markers?
the lettering is so precise until it isn't,
trailing off at the end, as if the sign painter developed palsy,
as if his hand shook when he sobbed.

paris this way.
new york, that way.
brisbane, another way altogether.
surely, this is a sign - you've been wandering this desert for weeks,
looking for a sign, any sign.
or is this another illusion?
another mirage,
another trick of the mind?

someone else was here, you tell yourself.
someone came this way before.
someone left this here,
knowing there would be others.

you sit for hours in the scant shade of a thin bush,
atop a rock outcropping
staring down at the cross-roads until, finally you know
it doesn't matter which one you choose;
you will keep walking,
keep walking,
walking.

someone else was here, you tell yourself.
someone came this way before.




[ from a photograph by rae kennedy - blackbirdstudio.ca ]