we’re all here now, in early fall walking over Salt Creek, breathing the collective air, right under our noses —Morning Fog
TWYLA HANSEN
WILLIAM KLOEFKORN
Through the window I can see that
in a farflung world
treelimbs are bending
—At the Pantry
We see the cattle circling the pens, open-mouthed,
bellowing; but we hear nothing but the roar —Tornado
LENORA CASTILLO
LOREN EISELEY
This is the end
Of property pride
Yet not the end
Of a door flung wide… —For a lost home
MATT MASON
A car
passes, driver raises a finger,
different finger than Omaha drivers, as
it ain’t obscenity, you got time to appreciate it
as you ain’t gonna see another car
for miles.
—Burton
where the leftover fence wire suns its loose coils, and stones thrown out of the furrow sleep in warm litters; —In the Corners of Fields
TED KOOSER
DON WELCH
good luck with your rural project.
it’s a wonderfully fertile world.
—The school greets me like a series
Were all the teeming regions of the dawn Unpeopled now? What devastating need Had soset so many faces pale with greed Against the sunset? —The Sowing of the Dragon
JOHN G. NEIHARDT
YVONNE HOLLENBECK
The simple upright beauty that will put them all to test
is a windmill on the prairie when the sun sets in the West! —A Windmill on the Prairie
Allison Hedge Coke
Until there is dust we must remain
settled here where we were lain. —Skeletons
You standing is a domino effect. So when I ask you to repeat after me, this is not a joke. This is not just for laughs. I am charging you to do something different and stand for your community. —standing for something