Feast of the Winds

    by Snipe

Listen-
can't you hear it?
close your eyes and really listen-
it explains why you can't concentrate
on your work or studies
a restlessness settles over The Island
and all who dwell upon

Finally
The Feast of the Winds has arrived
bags are excitedly
and absentmindedly
packed
and a mass exodus away from the cities and towns occur
the Islanders need no direction
other than the wind itself-
that calls them out of their homes and shops,
away from school and work-

To the beaches and grassy plains
anywhere open to the sky
to participate in The Feast of the Winds

Days earlier
a group of musicians
set up a bamboo pipe organ just off Dolphin Bay-
the incoming winds play an oddly complicated
melody on the giant instrument

While further down the coast
the Tibetans have made a pilgrimage of their own
and are thoroughly entertaining all gathered
with their acrobatic Dragon kites-
beautiful creations that are hundreds of feet in length
the heads are fashioned out of bamboo strips,
bent and shaped into a furious sight
held between their teeth is a Sunstone-
the kites dance and dive on the magnetic waves that band the world

It's obvious that the teams of flyers needed per kite
are not controlling them,
but merely suggesting favorable directions
The assembled Saurians are most impressed-
growling and stomping their approval at the spectacle

Outside Canyon City
the pterosaurs are performing feats of aerial ballet
The Island is of course an active player-
lending gusts of wind at precise moments
to enable truly breathtaking maneuvers

The citizens of Volcaneum
journey to the mouth of the ancient cone
that shadows their homes
having picnics and being mesmerized
by smoke sculptures The Island produces
using wind to shape the volcanic smoke
into historical and mythical scenes

Across The Island
the long multicolored banners
of the holiday roll and dance in the air
A young child
picks a dandelion head-
makes a wish
and blows the seeds up and away
some land within the field
the child is standing in
but a few
rise up high above The Island-
with a little push
to be carried out across the ocean
caught in the trade winds
the seeds travel far
to finally settle in distant lands

Carrying within each
a tiny piece of The Island
and finding receptive conditions
will hopefully spread
what we have come to call home elsewhere.

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