Light Within a Gathering Storm

By L. S. Heatherly

Quenching wanderlust, dispelling fear;
where end of human road
meets trail of rabbit and deer;

re-bonded with what is real --
with Life on Earth held dear;

wilderness-cleansed, the maverick,
returning to the City-herd's lifeway --
equivocate, conflict, and disjoint --
pulled off Black Canyon Highway
for twilight time at Sunset Point.

The local place of roadway lore
held one young couple resting there;
as night was, falling and foreboding, in '64.

Strings of verbal beads, an exchanging,
and, through conversation, a rearranging
of whats in the "what's happening?" of yore.

Babe asleep, secure and sound
back in the homemade wooden shell,
on old pickup-bed, images on edge of modern hell.
Parents, out of luck, Phoenix bound.

Beads and shells, ways of Lifeway happenings
in that Time and Being, of debated lore.
Voiced softly, yet deeply pondered, aimed at ripenings.
And sent into a gathering, cultural dusk, one night in '64.

Potato chips, a 29 cent bag,
freely shared with the maverick,
mostly just air, reflecting a family's plight.
Yet, tomorrow's breakfast shared, defys any Night.

One old truck, one old car, three youths,
a white-man powwow, a ceremony of cloudy sensing,
in three (and wide, collective Youth) in the year of '64:
sensing personal and cultural storms commencing.

Nothing else expected, a mark of human sanity:
requesting nothing but the sharing of humanity.

The maverick, as the flow of words
attains to soul-embraces and dying light, itself, slips--
below both Bradshaw Mountains and all human herds;
by slight of hand, a ten spot meets the last few chips.

Rolling it up, with "good night, good luck!"
Into a '53 Pontiac, Youth itself had struck
a Detoured Road from Life; yet, cleansed, might restore.
But, still, drove into the gathering storms in '64.

Aye, such gathering storms destroy and estrange.
Storms within storms; mavericks; cultural climate change.
But, now, begging one question: a human storm forevermore.

12/21/2009 All Rights Reserved