I have seen it often in my dreams: the Sunset Kingdom, where the sun’s last rays lengthen endlessly over golden fields rustling in the warm breeze.
Everyone runs there. Most run hand in hand, usually in couples. There are families in great lines like waves rushing to a shore that never rises from the surf. I run alone. So do many others. Sometimes I see them on the street, in my waking life. I don’t know their faces. But I know the desperate eagerness of a fellow runner. We don’t talk about it.
No one stops or speaks in the Harvest Country. But we all share the same race. The same prize awaits us all in the east. And behind us the reapers bring in the harvest, cutting and stacking sheaves. We hear the scythes’ song in the air, and the harvest’s scent follows close behind us. We do not miss a step or pause for breath.
The sun never sets there. It heats our necks as we run from it into the east. I think there is shelter there: rest and cool fountains under fruit trees. No one comes from the east to tell. But I see the same hope in every runner’s eyes, like the light of a candle behind a cupped hand.
I wish I could dream something else.
