The Haunting of Jackals

Where could I run
so the burning sand no longer scorches my soles?
Who will number my days as aimless wanderer
chasing a mirage of bubbling springs?
Is there no end to this land of thirsty ground,
the habitation of dragons,
where shifting sands yawn wide beneath my feet,
longing to swallow me whole
and not even spit out the bones,
so someone would know that I am gone?

Each dusk the scavengers skulk,
hackles raised and undulating with the dunes,
their shadows well disguised
against each rise and fall of swirling dust,
so I could never be sure it is they
who track the scent of my blood,
or anticipate their hour of ambush, when for a moment,
my lids droop for the briefest of respite.

So you plague the corridors of my unguarded dreams:
Rising beyond each nightmare turning
lies the fresh shock of your quiet violence;
your burning gaze round an unknown corner
a rude awakening to your untrammelled lust for my jugular,
exposed with childlike trust in a lover’s lies.

Long gone the days that I weep water;
the soulless sun of your beastly betrayal
has dessicated what remains of a broken heart.
What I weep now, is sand.
And all that’s left to me is this forever plodding,
in a land haunted by jackals.