| And hearing the song, he wondered no less, but he wondered with her now, he wondered on himself as well as on herself, and he heard the questions in the song, 'and if I'm a sail, then where is the wind from,' and he thought of himself, and the songs that moved him, 'and if I'm the wind, then where is the wind from,' and he thought of her, and the songs she had been singing to him all along, and his wonder brought him closer to her then, instead of pushing him away... And so he thanked her, and he said, 'I would sing you a song, to tell you where I am from, and to tell you another part of what brought me here, a part of what made me walk away from the town, I think, and a part of what makes me feel I must bring something back...' And then he sang a song to her , that he had been thinking of on his journey away from town... The myth of the cities that fell from the ashes red wind for the autumn of fire The price of the reason that told us to stay and to pay for the check with the time of our lives The myth of the cities that fell down the stairs black light for the shadows that ride The time of the day that has never been seen and we pay for the dark with the sight of our eyes The rain is holy but the rain makes you cry The myth of the traveler blinks at the wind returns in the autumn of fire The price of believing that we're here to stay and would pay for these steps if we'd ever arrive The myth of the healer that won't ask the soul but looks all the masks in the eye The age of the alchemy, strange and well known turns gold into right... The rain is holy but the rain makes you cry... 'That was a song about missing your soul,' she said. 'It is a myth that the cities fell inevitably as they are, like ashes from the fires that were built for warmth and comfort, it is a myth that what you have built is serving you still, and it is a myth that you should ride in tunnels, in holes in the ground, and not see the light of day, that even your streets should be in shadows of the buildings you have raised above the trees... 'You miss the rain, you miss knowing it, you even miss needing it, and you try to forget about it, because to remember is to remember how far you have gone from home.' 'To travel, then, is to come into contact with this sorrow, it is to promise the presence of something that, in order to stop missing it, you have also told yourself must be gone,' 'It is the world you miss. You build shelters and you are warm within them, you build roads and they speed your travel, you plant crops and you feed your children, and that is all right, but hasn't it come to the point where you live so wrapped in your own creations, and so far from the ground of your being, and the world from which you come, that your loss is so great that you cannot go on, that there is no road wide enough, or new enough, or straight enough, or cut long enough across the land to allow you to go on...' 'And what do your healer's say, if they say nothing of this? If they won't look past the faces that people are wearing, and see what suggests to them that they try a mask on in the first place?' 'Sickness is not a symptom, and healing is not to be found at any distance from the truth, but only at the heart, only at the heart of it all? but who will go there?' 'The rain is holy, but the rain makes you cry...' She was silent for a while after saying all this, and then she spoke again, 'I will go with you to your town,' she said, and as she said this, the sun rose in the sky, and the morning came, and it found them in the desert... (next page...) |