THE LONE CARDINAL
    
    Gazing from the bluff after it had snowed so pristine,
    I saw a cardinal in one of our evergreens.
    	I hadn't seen one, it has been so long.
    	I would have thought they were all gone.
    	
    It's got to be hard livin' in a valley of factories,
    Hard to find food or nest among trestles, trains and stunted trees.
    	And the calls of other cardinals must be hard to hear
    	In this river valley of progress here.
    
    The sun never quite came out, but the snow began to melt.
    The cardinal had soon flown, I can't tell you how I felt.
    	On the Soo Line, a freight train pulled through.
    	And I had to leave for the classroom.
    
    It's got to be hard livin' in a valley of factories,
    Hard to find food or nest among trestles, trains and stunted trees.
    	And the calls of other cardinals must be hard to hear
    	In this river valley of progress here.
    
    I guess, I ought to tell you just how I felt:
    Sometimes, I wouldn't mind the extinction of the rust belt.
    	In a thousand years, all of this'll be gone.
    	So as for this progress:  fare worse and so long.

Copyright © 1996 by Craig Eli Stone