Tom painted the wood with designs he has seen.
Boulder Heritage Festival will feature Anasazi this year
and we write..Boulder Cliff Notes this weekend.
My poem:
ANASAZI
The Red Sun
Little black or red square men
One hundred hands
painted by those long ago
who also left storage houses
or cliff dwellings high
on red cliffs.
My breath catches
at the leaping goat
hanging on a high cliff
impossible to climb.
Were they painting for the Gods?
God of wind. God of water.
God of food that came only with seasons.
As a child, I rushed to see those paintings
left behind...climbing high as I could.
I picked up a black obsidian arrowhead
down by Lampstand, laying on sand,
and a perfectly made white spiked one
by the Monkey House under a Cedar tree
lying there in that exact spot
where I am walking on a rare outing.
I am endlessly curious about those
who came before me.
The people who lived where I stand
and touch my life.
And I wonder...
Can I, like the Anasazi, touch lives
beyond my time with my scratchings?
Oct. 4. 2010
I see you are getting a good start writing about the Anasazi. I am doing my part by reading Tony Hillerman, today one about 'The Way of the Badger'. I like your poem and Tom's drawings are a vivid illustration. Saw in the news today a photo of paint splashed over some Indian writings in Arizona by vandals. What next? We need to respect ancient ruins, not go around defacing rock paintings that have been there hundreds of years.
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