Our grandfathers were strangers and their absurd notions Said uncle to a century that built few fences; Pragmatists, with six-guns, their dreams were never fancy; Beyond their mustaches, their eyes eloped with nations. Their caravans set wagon tongues at a peculiar star; Led at last to mountains, they sought to map Fidelity -- Went loco in windy canyons, but, lost, they looked harder and harder. Our fathers, more complex and less heroic, Were haunted by more ghosts than an empty house. Their joy was to thumb their hearts over. Masked like Freud They entered their unconscious by the second story. But what they were seeking, or how it looked or sounded, We heard about only once in a blue moon, Though they expected to know it if they ever found it. Every direction has its attendant devil, And their safaris weren't conducted on the bosses' time, For what they were hunting is certainly never tame And, for the poor, is usually illegal. Maybe with maps made going would be faster, But the maps made for tourists in their private cars Have no names for brotherhood or justice, and in any case We'll have to walk because we're going farther. Used with the permission of Copper Canyon Press, P.O. Box 271, Port Townsend, WA 98368-0271, www.cc.press.org | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE CREATION by CECIL FRANCES ALEXANDER THE CARELESS GALLANT by THOMAS JORDAN A SPIRITUAL AND WELL-ORDERED MIND by HENRY ALFORD THE FUGITIVE by LAWRENCE ALMA-TADEMA BUCK O' KINGWATTER by ROBERT ANDERSON OF CARLISLE PORTRAIT BY PICHER by FRANCES BAKER ON THE DEATH OF THE PRINCESS CHARLOTTE by ANNA LETITIA BARBAULD THE METAMORPHOSIS OF THE WALNUT-TREE OF BOARSTELL: ECLOGUE by WILLIAM BASSE |