Sentinel of Silence

 

He raises his arms to the desert light,
robes spilling with the colors of old earth,
and on the wall behind him
a greater figure rises—
the shadow of a chief,
an ancestor summoned,
a sentinel of silence.

The air thickens.
Every breath carries the dust of the dead.
Every drop of sweat
slides from his brow
like a bead from a rosary,
a prayer falling
to rectify a painful past.

The shadow does not threaten.
It guides—
leading his thoughts toward the horizon,
toward the endless desert
where forgiveness waits
like a hidden spring.

He forgives,
though the wound still glows.
He forgives,
though the ghosts still walk beside him.
And still, he chooses to remain apart—
alone with the desert,
alone with the sentinel in his shadow,
alone with the quiet ache
that binds him to the ancestors.

This is his pilgrimage:
not to return,
not to belong,
but to walk forward carrying both
the dust of forgiveness
and the solitude he refuses to release.