The Hero

Mortal and full of praise, I watch the enchanted hero busy at his chores: desert, tundra, prairie restless under an easy stride. Dagger in belt, sword slapping thigh, he passes from sight, the restored land sprung airily to green praise. Arachnid webs entangle life. A busyness of thread weaves silk into night— the long shudder of moonlight, a transfixed eye shuddering. Nothing is so easy as death, I try to say. But the hard fact of glazed eyes, the boy turned to solitude, lies face up in the center of all webs, roads unwinding stubble. Whoever is alone walks brittle filaments, late stars smudged on dawn, a night sky’s frayed dawn. Dare we evaluate life: This hero’s gesture charms eternity? Someone who paused here once on an ordinary day, troubled by the impatience of his calling, set up a hasty signpost: “Toward…” Nothing is so scarred as this place, shards of parched cloth trampled by footprints coiling crazed centers. Fresh with spring, light breezes play on dust. A whisper of rain. Ropes of skeined thunder twist sky.