How To End a Season Poem by Ofelia Zepeda

Food is put in place for the ancestors.
Prayer sticks are buried for the saguaro, for the season, for the earth.
Songs are sung for the spiritual health of everyone, everything.

In the fading light of a bright summer day the people sit down to eat.
There are decorations paying commercial homage to the saguaro.
Balloons with smiling little saguaros on them,
and others in large type reading, Saguaro, and in smaller print,
credit union.
Amid the festive decorations the sun lowers on the horizon,
colors begin to show.

The people are treated to stews of chile, different types of beans,
tortillas and breads.
Salad and chicken for the kids.
And of course there is the ever-present, ciolim, cholla buds,
for everyone.
Marigold, lavender, and a touch of hibiscus hang above the dry,
desert mountains.
The singer's soft voice carry songs across the desert floor.
To the east a bright star takes a long, trailing fall.
The glow is wide and slow.
The people point.
The gohimeli songs begin.
They step to the rhythm, feel the beat of the earth.
They look at all that surrounds them and drink the wine
for the goodness of the earth.
As the celebration continues a toy-like machine stumbles across
the landscape of a red planet.
NASA knocks on the window of America's childhood memory
with Rover, Yogi and Barnacle Bill.