A City At The Brink

On the hill there's a city with golden streets. The folk there wear jewels and go robed in silk. This is a bright city and rules a shining land. A peaceful city rests at the desert's brink. Water flows beneath it. In the marketplace, they gather and meet, These folk who wear jewels and go robed in silk. Gold flows from hand to hand. They call it life, love, meat, drink. They'd like to breathe it. The marketplace is closed, though business is not complete. Dusk-children go begging milk. In this bright city that rules a shining land, They huddle at trash fires. The city stinks. And now smoke wreathes it. Cold ashes bear the prints of forgotten feet. Walls and roofs are fallen, or lean together a-tilt. Jewelled bones stare from drifting sands. A peaceful city rests at the desert's brink. No traveller leaves it. Nowhere in all this waste will you meet One who was there when the golden city was built. Ask, when you see the traces of their hands What did the jewelled people think? Water still flows beneath it.