my winds swallow you said the future.

all the lungs of kings will stop and
heave again with my command.

desert of the americas in five million A.D.
a storm was let loose there
choking clouds of ice and
sun summer heat

zeniths of men on camels still kingly,
still found to be; a spanish
girl looks out of her window
covered in dust waving it from her face
with a knit covering of brown flowers
watching for her returning champion.

there in the distance!
he returns!
bloody with his brigade of muskets,
oh essain oh no;
she runs down through the rounded stones
swept and worn by sand, dark passing
through her, down out of the front door
tripping and losing a sandal,
oh no, and he
tries to hop spryly from his camel and fails
he can't help smiling as she cries
against him

they were the beginning,
they were the ultimate and final beginning,
wasted humanity broken up
children merely standing up
it was such a defeat
such a painful and difficult beginning
as the gotohsan beat a drum and smiled at his commander,
as she cried and rubbed the dust from his face.

it was as it was in the beginning, but
this time it was not the same,
when it was began again it was began in the
shadows of caesar's era grown short,
and lo, the shadows vanished.

 - "Laughter," Connelly Barnes, 2007-01-12