Shadowinds Poem by Grace Hays

Not sure of what
I see up ahead
Is it a man
with the wind
blowing through his hair
Or is it just a shadow
playing with the wind

The sun must be playing tricks
for nothing is there now
Just endless sand
with cacti here and there
Only open desert and sky
nothing more...nothing less

I look down at my feet
with sorrow in my heart
For I am alone
in this dry and arid place
Trying to survive this torture
for just one more day

Hoping to see
a friendly face
But there is nothing here
to see except for the sand and cacti
Wait a minute
I think I see a glimmer of something
Is it real
or is it a mirage

Then I see that it is
the same image
that I saw before
I decide to walk
closer to the image
But like before
the image disappeared

Instead of looking
at my feet
I charge forward on my quest
to figure this mystery out
To see if this image
is mirage or man
For if it is man
then maybe he will talk
with me

As I get closer
to where I saw the image
It appears before me again
right in front of my face
and I see that it is a man
and he seems to be talking to me
As I get closer I can hear chanting
and then I realize
that he is an Indian

He sees me standing there
and says to me
'I am what you want
me to be
I can be a man
yet I can also be
a shadow playing with the wind
I can be your friend
or I can be a shadow
just out of reach'

As I stand there listening
I think of how nice
a friend in this place can be
I talk to him
and get to know him
Then he said that
he would stay with me
'til I made it home

To this day
I will never know
If my Indian friend
was real or a figment of my imagination
He shows up
every now and then
just to say hi
He even told me
that his name is Shadowinds
For he is both man
and a shadow playing with the wind