By Karen Wolf
--
flashes, smoke
clouds, head slamming
commotion, bark
chips---Tecumseh fears bad
medicine of British rolling
guns blasting Fort
Meigs. A council
fire flushes wanning
warrior faces. The missing pulled from
sacred ground. Those
drinking from Tecumseh’s
fountain, certain to
retain their father’s
lands. Days of red
coat cannons kill the few hid
underground. Night
floats across the Maumee: axes
and shovels, proud
voices, twang
of a jew’s-harp, scream
from surgeon’s tent. Aboard
his black stallion he
circles the blockaded
fort. The fortified
general’s broken promises sail across knee
high cornfields thriving
on stolen soil; his
resolve strengthens. Reinforcements paddle
downriver, sun flickers on blue
coat buttons--they drive
out artillery, overrun
batteries. Warriors
nip at boot heels, drive
down a ravine to point
blank Shawnee guns, arrows, war
clubs. Musket fire, shouts,
thuds, clatter of parrying
weapons, groans, screams--last
heard by the dying.
His blood-soaked hands drip
shame at the carnage and
echo his mother’s refrain:
You should have
stayed out of our land.
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