Journeys and Places

Heathland to Coastline | The Island Beyond | Seeking | The Poetry Evening | In A Desert Place | The Last Boundary | Eucalyptus Wood | Quest | Riding Home

Quest

I set out on the road to you or nowhere
I travelled farther than the miles I’d covered
the journey stretching out unceasingly
much longer than the day and night now spent,
going far beyond the darkening of the sun,
the rising and declining of the moon.
I crossed parched deserts in a searing heat,
I sailed the widest seas in storm and calm,
from shores I watched the high and low of tides.
I slept in garnished tents with glittering lamps,
more often grounded under lucent stars.
Waking I always looked to East and West,
to North and South and far and high and low.
I searched the earth from heat to freezing poles
without a sighting or a sound of you.

Sometimes I ran after a passing stranger
only to find I did not know his face.
I’d hear a voice, go seeking through the crowd,
but it was never yours. Once in a while, I’d falter,
turn for home, but always something other drove me on,
until I came to a tired and lonely place and knew
I had been following the road to Nowhere.