MESA VERDE
by
Edna Davis Romig

Like ghost ships, sail these ghostly mesas in the mist,
Out of the grey morning.
Then broken free from shadows, great prows plunge through space—
High mesas ride imperially the purple plain

Green are the mesas of the day,
Green with pinon,
Grey-green with cactus and sage,
Gleaming with oak and the sword-leaved yucca,
Green with low cedar,
Green with pinon and cedar.

Ghostlike again in the indigo shadows of twilight,
Haunted by the spectral whisper of the wind
Through the cliff-houses wandering
Like the returning spirit of swift red hunters
In ceremonial dances to the four winds
And chants to Manitou
On the green mesa.

Silver at night,
Ebony and silver—
Lit to metallic splendor,
Lacquered to black masses of carved obsidian...
A gong quick struck under the pinons,
Deep in the canyon
Could summon ghostly medicine men
Back to the cliff-houses,
Back to the pueblos
In the Green mesa.