HISTORICAL POETRY
Persepolis-on-Hudson
a loose survey of folks who have called the Lower Hudson Valley home, in verse
the Mohicans
tracing
the gorges
and grooves
of the last ice age
they were both children
and masters of this vast wooded wilderness
the Lenape
fields of
maize and squash
encircling tribal homesteads
with a clan mother at the helm —
her people harvesting the brackish river that flows two ways
the Dutch
sixty guilders
and a handful of tulip bulbs
they threw in some exotic strains, for good measure
for the island of many hills — what a steal
they might have been giants
were it not for
the Brits
royalty
entitlement
but alas, such lack of imagination
ㅤthose that much covet are with gain so fond…
ㅤthey scatter and unloose it from their bond
warned their Bard
the Americans
a mere footnote
but a mighty footprint
your tired, huddled masses
built here the capital of everything
of madmen
of market wonks
of stars and strike-outs
of curtain queens and stage hands
the greatest stage set ever assembled
is the one that will remain
when your cities
are gone
The photo shows the Lower Hudson River, from Yonkers looking west toward the Palisades of New Jersey. The Hudson was called “Muh-he-kun-ne-tuk” in the Algonquian language of the Mohican nation, meaning “the river that flows two ways”, reflecting its estuarine nature. The flow of water changes direction along a 150-mile stretch of the river with the tidal influence of the Atlantic.
more history-inspired poetry
