0078 Thanksgiving Day Poem by Michael Shepherd

A celebration of the grace
of the past, or
a celebration of the grace
of today?

For thousands of years,
the Native Americans
whose origin is so mysterious
held, as do all the peoples in the world,
a celebration of the harvest
now brought home, rejoicing
in its abundant wealth and
offering gratitude to that source
from which it comes - as do we...

And how ironic, looking back,
that the Pilgrim Fathers, unprepared,
as many townsfolk among them were,
for the art of farming in a foreign land,
were taught, from those thousands of organic years
of experience, by those very native Americans -

Wouldn't you like to have seen, been there,
that day in 1621, as settlers
and the invited Indian chiefs
sat down together to celebrate the harvest
in brotherhood?

And then, today: beside remembrance of the past,
how beautiful to dedicate a day
to thinking, listing, all the many things
which we may be truly grateful for.
Will a day be long enough?

It's said, that every year
the day after the Thanksgiving feast
the wild turkeys of America, gathering,
as Native Americans of ancient, brown-faced line,
with lively turkey-trot and song and
stuffing themselves in rather
more natural ways, celebrate
survival