99, 100. Slide
Blackfaces at Johnson Ranch
Routt County, Colorado
Photo by Pat O'Toole
99, 100, Slide
99, 100, slide.
The smooth worn bead
Along the leather strap.
Another lamb runs by,
Wooden beads worn glassy
By the hands of my grandfather
My father,
And me.
The leather
Cut from the hide
Of a long dead cow,
Kept supple with oil
From generations of hands.
Beads—yellow and tan
Carved from the hearts of
Serviceberry bushes
By the careful hand of a craftsman
Also long dead.
An ancient abacus
Counting out the spring lambs
As they shoot through the run.
The government requires numbers
If they graze the forest grass.
Ewes and lambs.
Beads and leather,
Contemporary hands on
Old tally beads.
99, 100, slide.
