Exodus with Children

Peter Meinke

She was searching for a sign and listening
for a word while Ohio unrolled beneath
the old Mustang: Piketon, Waverly, Alma,
Chillicothe, Kinnikinnick-maybe the Indians
could have helped, if they were still around:
Do not move until Spring Moon, wash three times
in the Olentangy, name the children Fire Heart,
White Fox, Eagle Feather. Now they were singing
their school's fight song, voices like snow crystals
clinging to the ends of branches. A new school
waited, somewhere, new teams to cheer: truly
American now, displaced, on the move.
Five miles before Columbus, starlings swooped
and swerved in huge flocks, God's tribal flashcards.