A handful of dust

That was where it all went wrong. When, after endless wandering in the vast forests, we came to those branching paths and took the sordid advice of that old, wizened cripple swathed in purple. Who pointed a bony finger down the yellow road whose reputation seemed to promise so much: steel, money, the glittering city. Tragic that this caused us to overlook that other, fairer highway, which, in response to our query, the old man brusquely dismissed as holding nothing tangible or of worth or value. Now I know that what I quietly suspected at the time was right. That the other way led to the day that should have been: whereas the one we chose led to the night.