Deep within the throat of the desert,

Where the dunes stretch forever towards the sun,

There dwell things beyond our understanding,

Blending with the sands colored dun.

Right at the time when two worlds merge,

When the sun is a lazy bloated frog,

Floating just above the endless lakes of sand,

There comes a noise like the creaking of a cog.

Lurching, swaying, crawling, running,

The lumbering creatures crest a hill,

Their eyes are filled with a vacant fire,

As they move almost against their own will.

Floating above the dusty procession,

Are little glowing orbs of blue light,

They bob and they weave through the twilight sky,

Twisting in the breeze like a kite.

The creatures look almost like mummies,

Wrapped as they are in decaying cloth,

They drag their feet through the clinging sands,

Chasing after the lights like helpless moths.

Some of them look older than the others,

Some of them seem younger by years,

Some of them laugh dry, rustling cackles,

While others sob non-existent tears.

But all of them are missing something,

Dropped off of their faces is their jaws,

All that remains is a deep black hole,

With rusty chains trailing from their maws.

The creatures’ chains lie broken on the ground,

Dragging behind their desperate flight,

But they ignore the clanking cacophony,

As they each pursue their own special light.

But no matter how long they chase them,

The lights stay far enough away,

For as much as the creatures pine for them,

The lights want to find their own way.

Their minds are filled with lost memories,

Their hearts are filled with unknowable dreams,

They always look hopefully towards the horizon,

Even as they refuse to hear their own painful screams.

The body below, the soul above,

The dead march over twilit dunes,

Dancing a dance as old as time,

And clanking a never-ending tune.

The flesh is so much a slave to its soul,

Following it even after it’s gone,

But the soul is as much of a slave to itself,

As both sides stagger and bob from dusk until dawn.