Remnants

Inspired by a picture of cowboys herding mustangs to the home corral combined with my imagination of what lies just over that far hill.

As our expansive vistas bump against
encroaching boundaries,
cloud shadows slide along the short grass;
omens of darker days just over the horizon.

But here, just here
there is a sense of solitude and stillness.
Free range fillies, heads bowed,
haltingly make their way
toward the setting sun.
Each hoof beat muffled by dust
that erupts then hangs suspended
between sunlight and shadow.
The last vestige of their passing.

The not so distant highway hum
and the whosh, whosh of a traffic copter
drown the sound of mustangs and mule deer.
IPods play Waylon, Willie and Western Swing
as cowboy’s pray to keep their home on the range
from becoming a two story subdivision
with pools and putting greens.
So they ride, backs straight, heads high,
pushing the past lest it be overtaken by the present.
Jeff Hildebrandt © 2010