RIDERS OF THE SKY


RIDERS OF THE SKY


Do not tell me that
the Great Storm
of the Great Plains
never sheds great tears

never pours out his troubles
in his bitter quest to
cry himself to death

upon ancient grasses
and greedy cash-crops
from the Dakotas
to Old Mexico

that Fire and Rain and
the screaming prayers
of Sister Wind

serve only as a career path
for atheists in lab coats
measuring celestial tears
from weather balloons

or as a source of chatter in
climate controlled high-rises
where vegetarian millionaires
trade pork belly futures and

deep fried good old boys
sell seven grain bread to
New Age bakeries and
their mortgages to
Wall Street prairie dogs

Do not tell me that
the Riders of the Sky

the American West's
Flying Dutchmen of lost
and lonesome cowboys

never set out one
bright frontier morning
on pintos appaloosas
half wild mustangs

to scorch a path
across the badlands
on a quest for glory
and hard-earned coin

that on nights of
calluses and fear
when the holy crack
of close lightning
sears our eardrums

we never hear the Riders
slap the dust and sweat
from their horses' flanks
galloping blindly through
the celestial badlands
still seeking the way home

Do not tell me that
the Great Storm beats
with nothing more than
the physics of displaced air

for only a great heart would
run me down me so heartlessly
on a such fine thumbing day

first following me southeast
from Boulder to Denver
and too much auto traffic

then when I switched roads
heading north into open country
spinning like a coyote
hungry for it's own tail

chasing after me to Cheyenne
where folks live between
big boots and big hats

then twisting eastward
for one final lunge to
catch up with me on some
empty Nebraska highway
apparently built only for me

What manner of cloud
can follow its prey like
a mountain lion flying
upon the first eagle's wings

Only a spirit who has
shed its own blood
over and over since
time nursed at the teat
of the first volcano

Only such a spirit
could laugh so hard
staring down at a lost bird
flying the wrong way

How I curse myself
stupid city child
leaving my umbrella behind
in that ditch in Benson

when I could have seen it
torn apart into feathers
just before attracting
sacred thunderbolts 

I pray or maybe just beg from
deep within drenched bones
my nerves sliced into silence
as he parades over my body

ghostly horseshoes
beating my face into
gravel and mud by
the weight of raindrops

nearly rendering my
worldly goods into seed
myself into a new Rider
just without the horse

until having demonstrated
just who's boss on this trail
he courteously tips his
ten million gallon hat

and also having shed all tears
all grief and all ghosts into
my clothes and backpack

the Great Storm rides away
in search of all lost cowboys
laughing all the way to
the Mississippi River Valley
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