****Grandfather Obama****

[RUKUS]

Grandfather Obama (“Change”)
To the goat herder…even a hoofprint can change the sands of time.

An old wives tale
Says the barren trees
In the sand
Are the arms of the
Restless dead,
Sprung from earth
Only to be frozen by the winds of change.

Goats do not
Feel such things.
They wait
For me to lead them
From rolling sand
To brittle grass,
And today
They can not see
The silver clouds
That slow their march
Across horizon.

But they follow me.

Most days the Golden eye
Above stares down,
its fiery glance
A shimmer on the sand ahead
And I follow the light
Till its sinks beneath
The hills, and darkness
Blackens our path.
My father told me
That we are like goats,
Repulsed by fences,
and boundaries,
Curious about the
Simple world around us.
We yearn to roam
and trot, our prints
Left behind us
Traces of history
Soon blown away
By the gusts of tomorrow.

He said,
Only when
We walk together
Do our prints form
A path, -
A decisive mark through
Sun-parched earth,
That those who
Follow behind
may come to see
And know.

It is night time now.
I have seen my face in
The shallow waters
The strands of white
Sprinkled across my scalp –
Each arched
like the trail of a fallen star
at dusk.
My herd has followed me
To drink and rest.
I will lay down
Here and join the moons
That rise no more.
They will find another
Man to lead them
To rest and refuge,
Pasture and peace.

The prints of these
Remain the mark
That cleared the sand
For those that come.

It only takes a few goats
To make the way for many.

-RUKUS copyright 2008