The Perfect Arc Part One Poem by Daniel Brick

Kais! Kais! Do you know
who you are? Do you know
at least where you are?
You are standing on a ridge
overlooking a cliff. A few
careless steps and you will
trip, falling to rock-covered
shoreline below. You can't go on.
You must change direction.
Will you stay in this one place, and
let nature batter you through seasons
of cold and heat, scarcity and plenty?
You have entered a wasteland, you have
become an unthinking dweller in wilderness.

Kais, is this hapless figure before me
really you? Haunted by loss, bereft of
family, torn by impossible desires,
you are dying from the inside out.
You are gaunt and speechless, the bloom
of your youth has withered, your former beauty
vanished like the final decay of a once resplendent
rose. I am your loving elder brother, Kais, and
your silence breaks my heart. Is there not left
within you some flame which radiates your identity?
Reminds you of your duty to our parents and
our tribe? Rumors abound that a mere woman
has reduced you to this... I can give you
a harem of women who will smother her memory.
Why is this woman so particular to you?
Step backward, Kais, and take my hand.

(This poem is the first in a series of poems which will be a
MAJNUN AND LAYLA REDUX.)