A sere and empty land <br />Huge canyon vistas spotted with juniper and sagebrush <br />Vast cloudscapes in changing lights <br />Lizards skittering on washboard roads <br />The Ancestral Pueblans <br />(We must not call them Anasazi <br />A vulgar Navajo word <br />Meaning ancestor of my enemy) <br />Toiled in this fierce heat <br />To carry water, logs, and stone <br />They left for easier lives <br />Now ubiquitous “For Sale” signs <br />Proclaim a new exodus<br /><br />Stewart McKenzie<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/landscape-24-life-in-the-high-desert/
