The Ekphrastic Review, August 2017
I explored my sins wide open
the way the plains exposed themselves
to white men, and me, almost
one of them in rough cut
buckskin and breeches, mustang panting
between my thighs. But not quite
man enough to hold at a distance
their stares, hands, breath
on my face in Deadwood's
dark. I let them raid me
the way we crashed through
camps, torched teepees, broke
the sacred, and stole flesh for show.
By the time you came, Bill, the unbridled
sun had blistered my face saddle brown.
Rough wind had uncovered
my thirst as endless as Montana
sky when I rode beside my father,
before I understood the slice
of my knife deep in skin, singe
of gunpowder in my lungs, lost
lives behind me, a gaping stab
left by wild things I caught
but could not tame.