Las Conchas

This is the summer of drought.
The playas dried up like cracked words on the lips,
the heat wore steel-toed boots,
the wind pillaged sacred Chicoma Mountain
in dry wrathful blasts. The
snake-tongued flames drifted north on
Santa Clara land. A
cool fire they say,
slow to crawl lone wolf
low to the ground, not hot
like Cerro Grande was:
insatiable, a terrorist. How do you say
in Tewa,
the hell hound is on our trail?
how do you pray away these
orchids of smoke?

The spirits
of the dead drift from grave to
Indian grave ahead of the fire,
some of them grieve for rain,
some are armed and dancing,
some stay safely underground,
cooled by the timber still
white moon.

-John Macker