Little Big Horn

I walked across the sun splashed field
The river wound below
The tall grass swept the hillside where
The sage and yucca grow.
Wild flowers danced in the warm breeze,
A sea of waving fluff.
For me, that day, the sun and blooms,
They would have been enough.
But something moved within my heart,
A sense of history
Was stirring on the bright hillside
And calling out to me

I saw shadows of lost men where
No shadows should be cast;
I heard their voices whispering
In each small breeze that past

They asked if we remembered them,
Knew why they fought and fell.
They whispered to me of that day,
Of death and fear and hell.

Peace would have been the easy choice,
But that choice was not made,
And so we met upon this field;
And on this field we stayed.

One hundred thirty years ago
Where dandypuffs now wave
We fought through smoke, and dust and lead
To lay without a grave

Two days we waited for our graves,
Our bodies hacked and torn,
Some comrades fighting still, nearby,
While others ran, foresworn,

To fall beneath a rain of lead,
And die beneath this hill,
Where we now lie in shallow graves
While peace eludes us still.

We were soldiers, Horse Cavalry,
Our orders: “Bring them in”.
But legends have consumed the truth
Unchallenged by dead men.

Some call us butchers, some heroes;
The truth lies in between.
We were just men, like those we fought
Here on these hills of green.

We fought to hold the future for
A young and growing land;
They fought to hold the life they loved.
They had to make a stand.

Our battle lost, their war unwon,
All those who fought now dust.
Cold, marble stones remind the world
That we fulfilled our trust.

And when the whispers fell silent,
The shadows turned to go;
I stood alone in summer grass
And watched a puffball blow.