Dune Messiah

EPILOGUE

No bitter stench of funeral-still for Muad’dib.

No knell nor solemn rite to free the mind

From avaricious shadows.

He is the fool saint,

The golden stranger living forever

On the edge of reason.

Let your guard fall and he is there!

His crimson peace and sovereign pallor

Strike into our universe on prophetic webs

To the verge of a quiet glance—there!

Out of bristling star-jungles:

Mysterious, lethal, an oracle without eyes,

Catspaw of prophecy, whose voice never dies!

Shai-hulud, he awaits thee upon a strand

Where couples walk and fix, eye to eye,

The delicious ennui of love.

He strides through the long cavern of time,

Scattering the fool-self of his dream.

—THE GHOLA’S HYMN