Por que gawk -d não cria awkvars.out no meu diretório de trabalho atual?

gawk -dnão cria awkvars.outno meu diretório de trabalho atual. Por que? Em vez disso, recebo o seguinte stdout:

Usage: gawk [POSIX or GNU style options] -f progfile [--] file ...
Usage: gawk [POSIX or GNU style options] [--] 'program' file ...
POSIX options:      GNU long options: (standard)
    -f progfile     --file=progfile
    -F fs           --field-separator=fs
    -v var=val      --assign=var=val
Short options:      GNU long options: (extensions)
    -b          --characters-as-bytes
    -c          --traditional
    -C          --copyright
    -d[file]        --dump-variables[=file]
    -D[file]        --debug[=file]
    -e 'program-text'   --source='program-text'
    -E file         --exec=file
    -g          --gen-pot
    -h          --help
    -i includefile      --include=includefile
    -l library      --load=library
    -L[fatal|invalid|no-ext]    --lint[=fatal|invalid|no-ext]
    -M          --bignum
    -N          --use-lc-numeric
    -n          --non-decimal-data
    -o[file]        --pretty-print[=file]
    -O          --optimize
    -p[file]        --profile[=file]
    -P          --posix
    -r          --re-interval
    -s          --no-optimize
    -S          --sandbox
    -t          --lint-old
    -V          --version

To report bugs, see node `Bugs' in `gawk.info'
which is section `Reporting Problems and Bugs' in the
printed version.  This same information may be found at
https://www.gnu.org/software/gawk/manual/html_node/Bugs.html.
PLEASE do NOT try to report bugs by posting in comp.lang.awk,
or by using a web forum such as Stack Overflow.

gawk is a pattern scanning and processing language.
By default it reads standard input and writes standard output.

Examples:
    gawk '{ sum += $1 }; END { print sum }' file
    gawk -F: '{ print $1 }' /etc/passwd