Praise Song for Prairie Dog

All praise the open prairie.
Praise the open sky.
The clouds purple majestic as any mount,
Praise the white cotton candy clouds,
World without end.

Praise the prairie grass,
The swaying, dancing truth of the prairie grass,
Praise the dance and the dancer and the danced.
Almost all gone now.

Praise the wildflowers,
Sticky candy in summer heat,
Praise the red baneberry
Praise the prairie onion
And the lavender hyssop
And praise the leek
And praise the bluestar
And praise the pussy toe,
Especially the pussy toe.

All praise the Jack in the Pulpit
All praise the goat’s beard
All praise the various milkweed.
Long live milkweed.

I asked the man in the fancy train,
Where you headed and he nodded
And said Omaha.

I asked Joy Harjo for a word
And she said all praise the Muscogee,
the land known now as Tulsa,
All praise the sun and the moon
And all praise the gods who live there.

All praise the blue, purple weeping sky,
Afternoon rain,
Corn 4th of July high
And praise the putrid overfat pigs
And the barns, totems of industry.
All praise the water towers.

All praise crimson sunset,
And all praise the John Deere combine,
And all praise the crimson farmer,
In his crimson world, plowing yet another year.
All praise the prairie gods.
All praise their many names — —
Open sky, Omaha, Rain on Trees, Silver Streak.