Waistland
There in that dry desert,
that flat expanse of thirst and want,
live the empty people.
They have no nourishment in human food,
they drink little, laugh less,
their faces are worn and parched from smiling,
but all of their emotion has long since dried.
In these people we never see the cracks, the crags
beyond the present dunes-
we never see the rivers, which run deep,
for they are silent.
We see them glory in their desolation
we see the empty splendor, and believe
we see them whole--
but we are fooled by a mirage,
and when we dip our heads to drink,
to intoxicate ourselves with their clear beauty,
we taste the dust
and know ourselves deceived.
There in that dry desert,
that wasteland littered with the bones of misspent youth;
there in that uncharted landscape of self-destruction
live the empty people: they are dead.
