Neil Gaiman - DESERT WIND

There was an old man with skin baked black by the desert sun who told me that, when he was young, a storm had separated him from his caravan and its spices, and he walked over rock and over sand for days and nights, seeing nothing but small lizards and sand-colored rats.

But that, on the third day, he came upon a city of silken tents of all bright colors. A woman led him into the largest tent, crimson the silk was, and set a tray in front of him, gave him iced sherbet to drink, and cushions to lie upon, and then, with scarlet lips, she kissed his brow.

Veiled dancers undulated in front of him, bellies like sand dunes, Eyes like pools of dark water in oases, purple were all their silks, and their rings were gold. He watched the dancers while servants brought him food, all kinds of food, and wine as white as silk and wine as red as sin.

And then, the wine making good madness in his belly and his head, he jumped up, into the midst of the dancers, and danced with them, feet stamping on the sand, jumping and pounding, and he took the fairest of all the dancers in his arms and kissed her. But his lips pressed to a dry and desert-pitted skull.

And each dancer in purple had become bones, but still they curved and stamped in their dance. And he felt the city of tents then like dry sand, hissing and escaping through his fingers, and he shivered, and buried his head in his burnous, And sobbed, so he could no longer hear the drums.

He was alone, he said, when he awoke. The tents were gone and the ifreets.

The sky was blue, the sun was pitiless. That was a lifetime ago.

He lived to tell the tale. He laughed with toothless gums, and told us this: He has seen the city of silken tents on the horizon since, dancing in the haze.

I asked him if it were a mirage, and he said yes. I said it was a dream, and he agreed, but said it was the desert's dream, not his. And he told me that in a year or so, when he had aged enough for any man, then he would walk into the wind, until he saw the tents. This time, he said, he would go on with them.