Thistles

a poem

Swelling in her liver forty miles from Fort Laramie,
Sixty years prior she’d have died at home.
She is his daughter, and soon will be was,
At least once the sepsis sets in.

Journey was miles long and longer than the crow.
Each inch of land much dryer than last.
Scouts sent beyond recorded nothing of the land,
Except that the people there seemed like giants.

The marshal’s no coward, but he is despondent,
Despair has nestled in the pit of his soul.
The farmers are fearful, but they do not lose hope,
Luther said something that floats in their minds.

I am no doctor, but that girl is dying,
And there’s nothing to be done or thought, or said.
I had a feeling that she would be dying
At some point or other before we got home.