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In my dream, smoke was rising from a mountain
Like smoke signals of tribal chiefs
Communicating cautionary warnings
Of smoldering events ahead

I saw wild animals roaming the frontier
Frolicking in the prairie and dancing around trees

But the grasslands were strange, abnormal, out of place
For I saw transparencies of skyscrapers, buses and highways
And a montage of unnatural faces
Like in a Fellini movie
Appear like ghostly icons in a traveling circus
Evaporating into my nomadic dream

And everything around me was slowly vanishing
Into the valley ahead

Into a boundless black hole
Where light surrendered its gleam

I stopped walking for a moment
To transform this troubling scene
For it seemed so disorienting
And so obscenely unclean

For the sky was on fire
Choking up dust
And the machines that still were running
Were covered by rust

The smoke rising in the distant horizon
Spread out torrid words
Across the evening sky

Where souls were traveling in herds
And minds bowed to repetitive rhymes

My transformation left unanswered