I am reminded,
Of course,
Of an incident not too long ago
Between these same cowboys and Indians.
A studious general warns his captain
“don’t follow them over the ridge!”
And the captain leads his eighty men
In languid pursuit of native warriors.
The Lakota chief lures the captain
Over the ridge with his infantrymen
And their cavalry and their guns
And their thirst to destroy the lone savage
The general, it seems, knew there could be many
Over the hill
And that many human beings are hard to kill
But the captain only saw the one.
The one, the chief, let’s call him Red Cloud,
Knew, it seems, that being native and red
Was reason enough for these soldiers to follow him
To kill him and any others like him
So Red Cloud crested the ridge
And so did eighty soldiers
And so did two thousand braves
Coming from the wood on the far side
The captain died, the general was fired,
And Red Cloud won the deed to his tribe’s
Ancestral home, if only for a little while
Until gold was found there
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