Beneath the Waves
So many people simply looked at the desert on the surface. They saw the half-waves of the great dunes curling like grasping hands, baked solid in unending sun. They saw the lizards that sped-walked across the great wavering snake-belly patterns the wind made in sand, as if to say hot hot too hot hot ouch hot! They saw the heat rise as gossamer on a dancer's skirt: floating, weaving, creating the illusion of water when there was never any. And then they saw the sun.Â
The sun was watching. From morning until she became a belly red slit of anger at night (struggling against the coming of the dark, no less) it was an entirely cruel, unforgiving mistress. She had her eye on everything that moved below her and one might accidentally think that she hated it all--surely something which cooked all life out of that which was below them was filled with hate?Â
So it was, so many people simply looked at the desert on the surface and did not see the beauty that was in this place.Â
They did not see how, when the sun did lower, her radiant rest caused the amber sands to catch passionate fire: reds bloomed, oranges glowed, bits and beads of precious stone and glass in the sand glittered like the million stars about to come out. The plants that grew here were stronger than any other plants you could find in the whole world! They could live on just a few days of water a year, or they grew roots so unimaginable that they could find the slightest drop of water. They, too, were beautiful.Â
The sand was an ocean that hid the treasures of everyday life.Â
Her father did not like her to go out into the desert. He wanted her to stay in the city, stay inside. Stay safe. Get a job. Get married. Be safe.
It made her sad that her father only saw her surface and did not see the beauty of his daughter, hidden beneath the sand.
"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."
