Caravan

Four boys ran away into the desert, tired of life. Tired of an endless vaudeville. They decided to seek life and God, in loneliness and vacuum. They held forth an induced vision, that the Truth was out there.

The Truth was waiting to be found, and it was their holy duty to reach it. They carried their organs and their guitars, songs to keep them through the nights under starry skies, flickering sometimes above them in wind and in storm. Music is your only friend until the end, they held fast. They had delighted long years in the illusion that they found the World to be, and had spent many years enjoying its fruit and offspring. It was a good laugh and they had had many. But to reach greater, lasting happiness, they needed answers and they knew they had to take the Trip.

They wanted to roam the desert, wander dunes under a pitiless, angry Sun. If they stuck to their purpose, they would reach a great Oasis. At the Oasis, wondrous maidens would offer them cool wine and rich fruits. They would escort them to their king, a man of impressive power and many jewels. In his court, they would tell their Tales, of exotic creatures and the trees of thorns and hidden juices. They would tell stories to make the toughest soul weep, of hours and days without sight of Life. Of hours and days without water or food. Of moments of fierce contemplation and desperation, when consuming each other seemed the only safety. Of the day the Music died and true despair began. They would ask their questions then and find true answers for the king would know.

Why is Earth? When am I? Who is Time?

They would be Heroes for their struggle. Honoured, revered and offered women, sweet-sour and luxurious. And foods, the same and more.

They clung to the dream of this Oasis in their struggles. They no longer felt the Sun or its stare. They welcomed the evening, with its chilly winds that carried sharp sand. They were one with the sand, the dunes. The shifting landscape, with a blue sky and no clouds, only the Sun above, and soft, hot, folding sand below became their meaning of World. They forgot the vaudeville, the dancing fools and the lumbering fools. They forgot their mothers and their brothers. They forgot names and places, and other animals which did not give poison.

They walked into the Desert, looking for an Oasis and hoping for a Caravan to it.