NaNoWriMo Pt. 1: The Oasis

So, to the uninitiated, November is, to those so inclined, a month for the celebration of writing - National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo.  As part of this, I have decided to create a short chapter each week, the first of which follows:

Where did you go?

I have followed you so far.  I followed you across deserts so hot and dry, my skin turned to cracked mud; through forests so cold and damp, I would breathe rain; along shores so dull and grey, the sea and sky joined at one forgotten horizon, so that they formed a great wave that threatened to drown the cliffs and shore.

I followed you past scores of others, their bodies long dried out, but in fresh clothes, or freshly dead of body, but in ragged robes.  I had wondered whether you had once walked with them, whether you were the only one to make it There, and now lead future visitors.  Were they your friends?  Were they your rivals?  Was one your lover, your father, your sister, your son?  Do any remember you know, and would they recognize you in your glowing rainment, with your incandescent hair and shining hands?  For I know those clothes, that hair, those hands; in imagining your sight and repeating your promises like a prayer each night, I made you a transcendent being, the living proof of your promise.

And now I have lost you.  Here, in this oasis.  In this bright place, which seems as a dream to my wearied feet.  Where have you gone, among the flowers, sweeter than any perfume I have found, amidst the trees, bent low with fruits I could not have imagined, for I had never known their sweetness?  Have you made yourself a guest amongst the peoples here, who so freely give, and let me give?  I cannot find you.

I first saw you long ago, as my mother told me stories of your kingdom, of the land you promised to share with me.  My sweet, you glowed so brightly, even then, to my young eyes, ever dancing away from my grasping hands.

How they would laugh at my flailing, they who could not see you.  For I was your keeper, and you my treasure, my jewel, my dearest one.  None could see you but for my showing, even as you gracefully flitted about the one or the other, as if smelling a flower along the way.  You, mine, my own, and now, you vanish.  But none had known!  I had never betrayed you to them!  I knew what would become of their hearts, how they would covet you for themselves, and kidnap you from me.  So I protected you from them, my silence a great armor about your bosom, that none could touch nor tear.  And yet, I much have failed, for you are gone.  I am accursed, that my eyes had wavered but a moment.

For I had, my dear, closed my eyes here, even those eyes as are blind to this world, even they had shut as I lay to rest my scorched feet on the grasses, to cool the fevered heat of my brow by the stream.  In my great struggle, never had I lost sight of you; yet here I lie, alone.

Do you think the journey over?  Do you see our goal achieved?  You beckoned me to unsurpassed riches, you whispered to my ear of delights beyond my reckoning, you told me all and more, sweet confidante.  The flowers here are like none I have seen, the fruits of tastes beyond my imagination, the water of clarity unchallenged.  You spoke of this, of a splendor above all I had known, or could contrive to know; you spoke of a golden city, filled with peoples who readily served, and still more readily needed me, and me alone.  You promised me that crown among them, of joining them in the endless song of that realm, and I recognized my birthright before it had left your lips.

Is this it, then?  Have you seen me safe to your promise, and abandoned me?  Or have you been stolen away – does some covetous blackguard follow you to my city even now? 

Or perhaps this is what I saw, what you showed me in my fevered visions.  Perhaps that golden wall I had seen was actually the warm desert sands now surrounding me.  Perhaps the tall, wrought streetlamps were merely the shining palms, and the spacious gardens but the greenery abounding here.  The grand ball-gowns and luxurious costumes must have actually been the feathered dresses of the oasis residents.  And certainly, the fantastic beasts that soared above my head were, in truth, the lazy clouds that hover over my head, and the shimmering palace a distortion of the lush oasis lake, its golden fence the filigree of tall, thin reeds.

I would stay here for some time, recovering from the bitter cold and hot, the oppressive damp and dry, from lack of light, of color, of shade.  It was a peaceful time, and one in which I had only the barest awareness of what went on about me, seeing the world just as I had in my visions – a blur of numbed, bare experience, swaddled in emotion and the simple questioning of an infant?  What is this?  Who is that?  Can I…

But I eventually came out of that malaise, returning or regrowing into the world-weary sight of a being that has suffered much, whose face is pocked, scarred, and burned, even as it heals in such a paradise, whose legs are torn, hard, and calloused, even as they soften in the grass.  And I spend my days staring out into the desert, even as I enjoy the fruits of the oasis and bathe in its cool waters.

But, sitting at the edge of the oasis, I have noticed a disturbing thing:  a body, long dried and fading, sitting just as I sit, but a few paces away.  And another, further on a bit, also facing out.  I then notice the bones, hands rested where knees once were, missing teeth gritted in consternation, hollow eye sockets staring longingly into the desert.  I now notice the ground itself here, a chalky white soil, with flakes of bone scattered about.  My thoughts have had a great deal of silent companionship.  They, too, must have wondered as I do – is this what I sought, or could there be greater still?

My curiosity finally wins over, as it had not for the others, as I must know whether there could ever be a greater thing than what I see here; I have seen that otherwise, the question should never leave me, until the day I freeze in place, too, eyes turned to the desert beyond.  As the sands behind me shift and the oasis disappears from my sight, I see a faint, white glow out on the horizon.