Northwest Kansas.
Land of limestone outcroppings.
Where the bones show through.
Where wood was once so scarce
even fences posts were cut from stone.
North wind keeps a constant hand on the wheel.
Bluffs stick their bony knees into the creeks,
Buffalo, Wolf, Prairie Dog,
Minnesappa, Cheyenne for black water.
Elms, cottonwoods, sycamores grow
sparse along their winding threads.
Yucca spikes up through the pasture grass.
Old snow survives in the shadows of culverts
and deep between rows of winter wheat,
bright green against dingy white,
the fields of spring shrugging off
winter’s shabby garment.