HERITAGE

Edged by ancient trees, the old pioneer
cemetery was an island of green
dotted with weathered gray markers,
silent sentinels to those who’d gone before,
sturdy pioneers who bravely followed
their dreams on hash-marked trails
through verdant forests and across rivers,
from Virginia to Kentucky to this spot
in southern Indiana near the Ohio River.

Five generations later, I stand under
a cloudless azure sky, lost in wonder
at the endless chain of life that brought
me here, surrounded by ancestors who
trod this soil all those years ago, whose
blood runs red in my veins and whose
genetic imprint fashions who I am.  

I sit, leaning against a tree, listening to
birdsong as dusk turns the sky crimson
and gold, overcome with a feeling of
reverence.  I will be different somehow
after this visit.  I know now this is my
moment in time, my responsibility to
be an honorable link from yesterday
to tomorrow.

******************
Submitted to dVerse Open Link, February, 2017
(A visit to Hopewell Pioneer Cemetery outside
Lanesville, Indiana, where my fifth great grandfather,
a Revolutionary War soldier, rests with others of
our family).