I will entice you into the desert
and there I will speak to you
in the depths of your heart.

- Hosea 2:14

I. Argonath

General James Wolfe, thin, sickly and pale
floats down the St. Lawrence
in the very small hours of the last night of his life.
His bateaux is at the heart of the flotilla -
itself a small part of the greatest weapon ever known, the British Navy -
that he, James Wolfe,
miserable as a child for his sensitivity,
now commands.
His staff gathers round a hooded lantern
made feeble against watching eyes on shore
the secret landing at the Cove du Foulon
that leads them to the backdoor of Quebec
less than an hour downstream.
In the dark, in the cold, in the fear before
the battle that will decide these last five months
of siege and bloodshed,
there is still time for comradeship.
The officers, equally disgusted by their leader's frailness
and awed by his brilliance,
bracing their feet against the boat's roll on the river,
listen to Wolfe's choice of pre-battle reading:
Gray's "Elegie."
The last verse dies away in the pre-morning stillness:
"The paths of glory lead but to the grave."
Out of the dead silence, out of the reverence, out of the private thoughts
of men about to enter battle,
Wolfe speaks quietly.
Gentlemen, he says,
I would rather have written those words than take Quebec.

We drive down the slight grade from the railroad tracks
hearing behind the scraping of Patricia's car, heavily weighted,
on the tracks themselves.
Single file, our line of cars follows the track worn into the weary alkali mud,
tossing and slanting like small boats at the mercy of a capricious wind
until we come onto the flat and peace of the playa itself.
We all stink of sulfur, of sweat, of mud from the hotsprings
and our eyes are narrowed against the reflection of the sun
rising now behind us, dazzling on the whiteness of the ancient lakebed.
We stop, descend from our cars, gather
in the small flat undistinguished space between.
Miles ahead of us, the temporary city is filling.
We cannot see it from where we stand in our circle
but we feel its pull as the home that it is to all of us
no matter where we call home the rest of the year.
When we start again, we will arrow directly towards the city's back gate
perhaps guarded, perhaps not;
perhaps we will have to explain where we've been, perhaps not.
Now, we stand together;
some pull out cigarettes and light them
a bottle of tequila makes the rounds
and Jamie, forever unprepared, drinks out of Jan's waterjug.
The festival begins today.
Before we go back in, you say,
since we probably won't be together again, all of us at the same time,
for the rest of the week,
I wanted to read this to you.
Your volume of Tennyson is battered and dog-eared
and just one of the many books weighing down your pack.
A small wind rises and we huddle,
shoulders rubbing shoulders, arms around waists,
hands clasped together,
while your voice sounds:
Come, my friends, 'tis not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite the sounding furrows;
for my purpose holds to sail beyond the sunset,
and the baths of all the western stars,
until I die.
When you finish, my eyes are wet,
Patricia is sobbing silently into her hands,
and Jan and Tammy are hugging, tightly as if they will never let go.
Us, we know no battles, except with ourselves
and sometimes with each other.
But all of us, every last person in this desert sunrise,
know that we would rather be here to hear this morning poem
of courage and beginning, to share it together,
than to win our solitary victories of our non-desert lives.

II. Ithilien

III. Sammath Naur

Two weeks, 23 years apart.

The first week began with a flight.
Ironic that the same word describes both an airplane journey
and an escape
when in fact this flight returned me to
what I had left to escape months before.
The message had come to me
thousands of miles and an ocean away
the actual words forgotten, boiling down to only four:
Your father is dying.
I flew home to watch you die
hoping you wouldn't,
knowing you would.
I landed in New York
took the train to Philadelphia
waited in the station for an hour
for my mother to pick me up,
our reunion strained and joyless
with the knowledge of why we were there.
I spent that week in the hospital
watching you wither
watching the cancer erode your body, your brain, your consciousness.
I broke down crying when I went in to see you
and you didn't know me.
Our family - your wife and children -
provided such closeness and comfort to each other as we knew how
But we were already too far away, too divided, too isolated
to do much more than stand there mutely
or squabble about nothing meaningful
or offer the token, It'll be all right.
I knew it wouldn't.
We never learned how to be close in the years before your death
and we never would now.
The day after you died,
a skeletal figure gray-skinned under the white sheet,
maybe peaceful, maybe just too tired to continue,
that day we met
and divided the things most important to you.
To one went your beloved canoe,
to another your father's bayonet with the swastika on the handle
brought back from his native Germany in 1936.
To me went the signet ring that was your father's
and his before him.
I was to bear your legacy,
to wear the ring with his, your, my initials engraved into its gold.
You were dead.
I didn't know what that meant.

This week, I drove up the long desert road
winding and rising and passing the dry Lake Winnemucca
and the tufa-piles
and the sign at the turnoff to Limbo
and stopped when I arrived at Black Rock.
My family was there to meet me,
the ones who I am learning to be close to,
who I let myself believe when they tell me it'll be all right.
Our reunion was joyful
and when we said, I'm glad you're here
with our words and our eyes and our strong powerful lasting hugs
we all knew we meant it.
This week I learned many things.
I learned how to be cared for.
I learned how to notice what people do when they come together,
and how they stay together.
I learned how to pray.
I learned how to listen to that small still voice inside
and when one morning I asked,
on my knees, my forehead pressed against the playa,
watering the dried mud with my tears and my snot
and shaking in the presence of God,
when I asked what I must give to the Fire
and the small still voice told me,
You must throw his ring in,
I listened and knew that yes, I must.
When the Man fell
and we thousands surged forward
I left my family clustered and walked towards the heat.
At the center, close to the Fire,
a circle of people I did not know but will never forget
danced, shouted, swirled round the yellow and red leaping flames.
I walked into them, let myself be carried halfway around the circle,
always facing the flames, always turned inward.
In my hand I clutched your ring
that I had worn for almost 23 years -
all that I have left of your body,
its gold pressing against my skin where before it pressed against yours.
I stepped out of the circle and took one step closer to the Fire
and with one swift unregretful motion I threw the ring in,
watching its glittering arc all the way into the seething flames.
It is gone. I feel it missing every time I lift my hand
and I know this:
you are dead.
I can let you go now.
You, who always loved starting the fire
who always fed it
and always kept the poking stick -
you understand.
You are dead.
My life begins now.