Today Pegman took us to Palisade Rim/Ute Petroglyph Trail, Colorado in order to inspire a 150-word story. I’ve visited this area many times and am always fascinated by the petroglyphs, stories told by ancient hands or just a, “Hey! I was here.”
The People lived on this land for one-thousand years
before your people came,
offering greed and war
and turning our landscape into peaks of tattered garbage,
our lakes to pools of poison,
and our rivers into flowing yellow acid.
We hunted bear, fox, antelope, bison,
took only what was needed
and gave back ten-fold,
leaving the land unaltered
while moving place to place.
We thanked Mother Earth for her bounty.
Offered prayers and gratitude when she provided peace.
You? You brought disease, war, and tears beyond all imagining.
Soldiers killed our women and babies; butchered our men.
And when that failed to annihilate us
your men slaughtered our bison,
leaving piles of bones strewn across the grasslands.
Now you are welcome to this earth
for you have ruined the surface
and what lies beneath.
We will bide our time
until your God comes to ask,
“What have you done?”
Up From the Ashes 