A Wisconsin Poet’s Guide to Nebraska
1.
Long thoughts no longer, only
a line
or two or three.
2.
When you
don't
have mountains
the clouds
have to
do.
3.
Wind, like
a shepherd,
gathers up
clouds.
Hawk, like
the wind's
harbinger.
4.
Now torn
clouds above
the torn
land. Shadow
of nothing
falls on
nothing.
5.
A field of cattle
and at greater
distance, stones.
This is not
Chicago.
6.
Perhaps you are not
middlewestern.
Perhaps you were born
to these sandhills.
Hawk on the fence post
says, “Hello, brother.”
7.
Low clouds
and the shadow of clouds
all the way to Omaha.
—Tom Montag, Fairwater, WI
