THEY CAME WEST

They came west,
my father's ancestors,
across the prairie,
in a covered wagon.
Their first home
in Kansas
was a sod-roofed
hole
in the ground,
called a dugout.
They prospered.
But now the land is gone,
the family home
is gone.
Now my fear
is that we will all
end up
in another
hole
in the ground,
without any rights.
The country that
my father's ancestors
lived in for
three hundred years
is being sold
to the highest bidder.
I try to warn
my sisters and brothers,
but they cannot hear me.
They cannot hear me
from seven thousand
miles away.

3/2/2015