Deadwood

Deadwood

Stepping into the light out of the shadows

I hear the bottom of my shoes move some gravel, a scratch not unlike the sound

Of a needle going across the record the wrong way

I see the old, red brick, majestic and journeyed

High above me blue sky, brilliant and crisp, light wind

The shadows extend across the path before me in a sixty degree angle

Cutting off the alleyway into sections of dark and light amidst the ancient façade

I wonder how many people have passed this way

Looked at the mountain face before me

Through the windows of progress, architecture and imported culture

Through the eyes of the indigenous, the old grandfathers who once roamed this terrestrial

So many gazing upon the rock, its subsequent strength, towering with pine

I hear echoes of the past and see where I am

Old buildings, majestic in the ambiguous West

The land beneath once breathing, still present in life

Surrounding the seemingly stalwart structural surroundings that will only be replaced

One day by the dust, the prairie wind that echoes through this valley unrelenting