Buffalo Dusk by Carl Sandburg

The current exhibit at The Arts Center is a collection of photos of the American West by Laton Alton Huffman (1854-1931).  My father romanticised the Old West, and I cannot help but view the exhibit through his eyes. 




Huffman worked as buffalo hunter, yet later in his life he lamented what he called the "great tragedy of the .... extermination of the American bison."  We are hard on our ancestors.  We demand they have the foresight that we ourselves lack. 

The buffalo are gone. 

And those who saw the buffaloes are gone.

 

Read "Buffalo Dusk" out loud.  The rhythm is mesmerizing. 

The buffaloes are gone.

And those who saw the buffaloes are gone.

Those who saw the buffaloes by thousands and how they pawed the prairie sod into dust with their hoofs, their great heads down pawing on in a great pageant of dusk,

Those who saw the buffaloes are gone.

And the buffaloes are gone.

Poet's reading of Buffalo Dusk.
More photos by L.A. Huffman