THE STORM BEARER AND THE OLD MAN OF DIRTLAND

They say the old ones…

that when the storm rises over the plains

and the wind changes its voice,

it is not only the weather that speaks.

They tell that in the Sacred Mountain a Navajo man was born,

marked from the cradle by the spirits of thunder.

From a young age he walked with the storm,

listening to the lightning before it split the sky,

following signs that leave no trace

and that only the ancients knew how to read.

And they also tell that in Dirtland there lived an old cowboy,

made of dust, sun, and time.

He learned to hear the dry earth

and to keep in silence the stories of the West,

those that do not fit in books

but weigh like lead upon the soul.

They were never the same man.

There was no need.

One spoke with the sky.

The other, with the earth.

But they say

that when the thunder crosses the plains

and the dust rises without wind,

the Storm Bearer comes down from the mountains

and the Old Man of Dirtland stands still, listening.

Because the storm recognizes its own.

And where the lightning bites the ground,

the sky and the earth remember

that there were men made to understand them.