Star Chant Against Extinction

for Mike Olito

Soon the calling must begin.

Always in this hour, the beauty
of dying light revives
our fear. Birds come in
from the sky as the wind
backs into silence.

If our voices fail
to raise the shining tribes
of the sky, earth
will blacken
and sink into endless night.

We can already hear
the pale ones, gathering
beyond the sacred well.

We set out the circle
of painted stones and begin
with drums and shells and rattles
even before the last fire

dies into smoke and rust at the edge of the sky.
 

© George Amabile