photoart: ralph murre
BAD
LANDS
by
John Flynn
Inspired by an oil
painting,
“Waiting
for a Chinook: the last of 5000.”
by C.M. Russell, known as The Kid
The
old cowhand swayed serene
around
the potholes. Every sinew
slack
in the backseat of his
youngest
son’s new Chevrolet.
His
elbow high and out the window,
he
watched the miles peel away
on
the county’s arrow
straight
red scoria road.
From
a distance the red and
white
big touring car kicked up
cyclones
and looked to be
on
fire or re-entry from a
junket
into inner space.
From
out the side he
assayed
his time’s retreat.
Up
front the windshield
framed
a vanguard
trail
of slag waiting to be
churned
back into dust.
They
lived here by
the
thousands then,
in
ones and twos,
on
farms, in little towns.
Contrails
lining up above.
Echoes
seeping out from
missile
silos underground.
Few
folks remain. And
soon
these few will
view
the remnant herds
of
settlers like the
buffalo
used to do.
Emigrants
scrape something
off
the top, he thought,
but
not much more. Eventually
the
plains reclaim what's theirs,
and
plow black ash back
into
white boned earth.
Charley
Kid got it right. He painted it
a
hundred years ago and more:
“Waiting…The
last of 5000.”
Long
shadows slick down the buttes
nearing
home. The old man smiled
to
himself alone: some say
I
don’t recall but know,
I
didn’t break down
or
tumble off my horse.
Through
the cranked down window I
catch
the cooling scent of sage and
youth
and recollect that
all
I ever thought
to
be I am.
I
make no play
on
maybes.
I
do still what
I
say I will.
I
crippled
no
one
up
but me,
not
the country,
nor
the spirits
camped
out here.
Those
things
I
do recall,
and
don't regret.
~
first published by the Gilcrease Museum
of Western Art
