Dancing and chasing dust devils

One day the dust devils came,
Whirling dervishes of dirt,
Silently scraping the parched earth.
They came in a magic ballet,
Creating an entity of motion.
Their passing refreshing,
The hot searing touch of a lover,
A sudden sweaty midday passion,
Twisting in the sheets of desire.
When the dust devils spoke
Their voices were whispers,
The raspy hissing of sand.
Each towering funnel of chaos
A spiritual connections from earth,
To the gods in the sky.
I felt that there must be ancients
Buried beneath the parched land,
As the dust devils passed them
Their spirits were sucked up
Sent into the clear blue above.
They did not thirst for water,
Only dried withered souls,
Dessicated corpses of rock and clay.
With a gritty realization,
That I too was made of them,
I knew they would be back one day
Searching for my life’s emptied bowl.
Dancing, shimmering in the heat,
Reaching out to carry me home,
Back to where I began.
For as I was I will once again be.
So I danced under the summer sun,
Danced and chased the dust devils,
Like so many dreams running away,
Until exhausted we lay down to sleep
Where the day met the night,
On the slope of my mother’s
Cactus covered rocky shoulders.

Copyright: 2009, Donald Harbour