Melanie C. Campos ~ MahTame

SPENDING TIME AT THE WICHITA MOUNTAINS

One cannot really know peaceful, quiet times unless spent time in the Wichita Mountains.
No traffic jams, no road-rage, no hurrying and scurrying to work or school
At night, with the window opened, and hearing a bullfrog or two croaking away
or the lone coyote howling or yipping in the distance,
or just listening to the wind blowing through the trees, sometimes with a gush,
sometimes with a mildness that soothes even the most irritated soul.

Remembering days-gone-by; remembering walking to the woods
making outlines of a home out of cobblestones
using tumbleweeds as brooms for cleaning out the fallen oak leaves,
and hoping and possibly praying that no snake comes out to startling the soul.

Nothing is like sitting near the creek and watching the water trickle
over the stones, or the lone stick or leaf floating lazily downward to a destiny unknown.
It’s amazing that the wind isn’t as boisterous as from the hill above
and, down into the woods and creek, only a waving breeze flying by.

How I love to feel the wind caressing through my hair and across my face,
speaking to me as life goes on around.

O wind, tell me what stories you have learned!
O wind, tell me who passed through these pastures so grand!
O wind, tell me the tales of my ancestors of long ago!

Ahh, this is the life. Here in the mountains, in the valley,
a tranquility that seeps into my heart saying, “No more worries, dear soul,
for the troubles of the world are only a passing phase.
Like I, the wind constantly passes through one place to another
dispelling the badness away and only the good thrives.”

A View of Mount Sheridan in the Wichita Mountains,
near the location I stayed last week when I wrote this poem