Monday, March 30, 2009

Kennesaw Mountain


I went there.
I saw winding roads
and ridge backed hills
the locals call mountains.
The ground was all red clay
and the creeks and rivers churned
like bloodstreams of coffee and cream.
It rained a constant drum roll of rain.
There were minnie balls and artillery canister
bored into the wood of the trees
and once there were fields 
littered with bloody butternut
and splintered Illinois bones.
The land is a battery
holding the charge of marching boots
and railroad currents of human electricity.
There was human bondage 
and internecine defiance 
terminally opposed at dead angles.
It rained a constant drum roll of rain
that sprouted Easter threads of Jonquil
in the scrimshaws of the eroded earthworks.
I saw the will to union 
blossom at the bottom 
of shallow scratches in the earth
meandering in lines,
receding from the Snake Creek Gap
past Kennesaw and Peachtree, 
south to Atlanta.



2 comments:

Dana said...

Beautiful. Makes me homesick.

ScaughtFive said...

I really really like that part of the country. Want to spend more time there with you.