The Chase That Never Ends

I have been running through centuries,

chasing the echo of something unnamed—

a sound between heartbeat and promise,

a scent left behind by what I almost touched.

Every dawn begins the same:

footprints ahead of me, never my own,

fading into mist as if the world

erases its memories out of mercy.

I have hunted love,

and found it trembling beneath a sky of broken stars.

I have hunted truth,

and found it laughing in the mouth of silence.

Sometimes, I think the hunt is all there is—

the ache of wanting sharper than any blade,

the pulse that says: go farther,

though the path ends in shadow.

In one forgotten field

I finally caught her—

not the deer, not the dream,

but the reflection of my own eyes

staring back from a still pond.

She did not flee.

She vanished into me.

And when I rose,

the forest bowed its head,

as if it knew the secret at last:

that every hunter becomes

the thing they seek.

I am both the arrow and the air,

the wound and the healing wind.

The hunt never ends—

it simply changes shape,

whispering through every soul

that still dares to follow.