Smallfields of Desert Sands

Roxy, Russell.

Everything that this old and grizzled 

war horse was, is, could be–

I owe it to you.

Thank you.

Deep within the frozen woods,

an axe finds its home and a tree meets its end.

A wayward soul, lost and angry,

left alone to face himself, his melancholy slowly burying him.

The forest sleeps under the blanket of cold and darkness.

Damned he feels in his rage,

that which broke hearts and said goodbye to love,

where he would find naught but pain and solitude.

Suffering perpetually until

daybreak.

It was the voice of the Sun

echoing from Smallfields of sand and light.

They carved their way into his spirit,

gracing a frigid core with their warmth.

Love would seep into his bones,

mending scars of the heart

neither man nor medicine could heal.

They taught him what it was to love,

to be love,

as their laughter and kinship echoed

into memories of nights danced away amongst

the pouring rain in those gleaming canyons,

which had nurtured two spirits born of love.

Those desert sands housed hundreds of nights

camping with beloved family.

Lessons of faith, and science, and art, and loving joy were taught

to budding saplings

raised by two great trees of light,

branches that carry leaves of wisdom, joy, empathy and compassion,

a forest of community providing oasis amongst a canyon of apathy.

Those glowing lights had found his heart and given him home.

This grizzled and hardened man, once alone, found comfort and

peace in prayer and joy,

in song and tender stories with heads on one another’s shoulders.

Tears rained down from a lifetime of pain, dammed up behind his heart.

How this old war horse was ever worthy of such kindness still

escapes his battered mind,

but he would never scorn or waste this precious gift,

that which gave him a sunrise of peace, ending a seemingly

endless storm–

A light to blot out the darkness that would have swallowed him whole.

There is no way I could ever thank you enough.

I could write to you a thousand times and hug you both a thousand more.

The methods of my gratitude are as boundless as the love you’ve shown me.

This love you gave to a frozen heart–

it melted me at my core.