THE DESERT SOUL (ILLUSORY REGION)

The group of camels used to live in the desert
Who caught and confined them in the middle of green forests?
I heard them talking one another anxiously:
Those people sold us for fulfilling their greed

A camel came to my side crying in a whine voice:
He remembered the sun, white sand, green oases
The desert soul gleaming in the illusory region
His mind wondered when the war would be ended?
In this world, only two-tenths of people lived in honesty
The one-third of the rest lived in deceiving one another
Many fights demolished the ground
They struggled for snatching oil barrels.

The two other camels were arguing about the beauty
Muslim women always covered their faces for far watching
Because kings’ achievements would be collapsed
By the intrigues of women beauty
They talked together that: Later, Buddhists would lean against pagodas
Wailing so bitterly that the trunks of banyans getting numb cold
The Lamb would be asleep, the Father be upset, the God vanish
The sun would shake shattering the whole galaxy.

Three camels stood head-to-head telling stories:
The nature mother excessively spoiled humans
Let them blocking up rivers and drying up seas as much as they could
Allowed them burning and destroying forests, killing animals and trapping wild birds.
They divided the earth into hundreds of pieces
Then, they forgot one another, so they encountered language difference
It was unable to dissuade the crowd of arrogant people from bad actions
The earth became sad, lamenting in silent midair.

Four camels ran around me in anger:
Hey, humans, you should understand about the lifestyle of herd
Look at Bees, Ants, Elephants, Tigers and Lions
They need a leader for keeping security
Life, indeed, has the rich and the poor
The foolish make believe that they are smart
Do not dream that Elephants could eat Ants
Do not confine camels in green forests.

But I understand and those Camels also know:
The sky darken making the eye of dusk broken
When sunrays could not touch the earth’s soul
Humans would bury themselves in a heap of loneliness
Nipping together lies and trickeries
Greediness and fights make them ferocious
Sins flicker in wind and sand
Swallowed up by the dark hole blinding the eye of time.

Ngọc Lê Ninh