I walked through the deserts,
the breezing brusing my shoulders,
becoming my breath,
whispering my name.
So I followed it.

It led me through the barren brush
stiff and wide-awake
and the dried husk of the moon was rising
into the indigo night.
So I watched it.

I thought I heard cold voices
and saw orange eyes glowing back
like half-set suns they watched me
and the voices rose like wavering heat.
So I listened.

Words were not their ways
as I encroached upon their land
but then he came, a shimmer, mirage
his tongue flickering like a flame.
His eyes as deep as pools of water.
He said, "I am the lizard king."

His skin was a royal pattern
his claws were purple, sharp.
He turned up his nose and hissed
and scratched at a fallen tree.
So I stepped back.

He said, "I am the lizard king."

I ran.

The moon fluttered in the bone-dry wind
the warm sands clutched at my feet
don't go, don't go, don't go, they shrieked
but I knew I could not stay.
So I kept running, on and on.

Dead, stiff grasses crunched under my step
and my breath drew in gasps of dust
But sitll those half-sun eyes followed
still that skin shimmered in the dark.
So I closed my eyes.

I opened them when the sun rose, weary
hot and squinting ablaze
four-clawed hands of royalty reach
and carve his name in the baked rocks.
So I stood still.

Everywhere I looked I knew
this was his land, his realm
and my stay was brief but the heat burned it in
and my dizzied head, my thirsty throat
remembered his majestic rasp.

"I am the lizard king."