Thursday, March 13, 2014

those wild western heroes: 1 & 2

those wild western heroes: 1
(dedicated to Dee Brown's The Westerners)

children of the sun
seeking seven cities of gold
behind a half-naked black man
in colorful head feather .
 ambassador Esteban he was
 with a pair of greyhounds running beside
and three hundred Mexican Indian servants, many handsome young women
with Mendoza and Coronado right behind
the obliteration
oh dear poor zunis at hawikuh pueblo
what could you have done
the cleansing had begun
we are all forgotten ones

those wild western heroes: 2

medicine paint Catlin
who broke from them all; his wife, his parents,
to set up an easel for Lewis & Clark
and have an opportunity to view Plains Indians
'in their natural simplicity and beauty.'
beautiful Catlin
determined that the whole world see the American west
most thrilling scene he'd ever seen: meeting Comanches!
and he wanted us to see how thrilling!
but
interested not  the public
the government
 in his collection left rotting away.
no interest they in garnering sympathy
 for the race they would destroy.
for the paint brush that brought a generation 
visual impressions of the American west
who lays in Brooklyn's greenwood cemetery
with black moccasin spirit defending his tomb
  from ugly Parkman who liked his pictures,
wrote the Oregon Trail
followed by thousands,
and ended America.


July 2012

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