Mourning the Old Ways

*




The insolence of the mockingbird

calls the sun

to rising

with one sour note

of greeting.



Hills made of purple and red

stretch without limit-

not a hint of ending.

“Awful things were born here,”

their majesty whispers,

“and giants risen up

from the soil.”



Their voices filled the country.

Their afternoon songs

filled the spans between vistas

with intoxicating syrup.

Their instruments pulled notes

from the air for the earth.



The wolf returns home

for the plains’ ample

feast; colors of sky

and earth and water,

digests the splendor,

gives back

a low howling.



They are gone,

no music

falters in agony

falls on red hills

Only a sharp lament;

“the day is over,”

then the silence.




                         

                           -Brent Allard

previously published in Sahara