Conservation Land

[vaneramos]

The daily challenge from NaPoWriMo didn't interest me, but I found another poetry prompt: to form kennings (compound words or compact phrases) for commonplace things and write a poem about them. I tried turning a simple afternoon excursion into something more remarkable.

Conservation land

We leave our steel chariots
asleep by the post
headwater of all journeys
solitary or in pairs
hairy grin-rollick beasts at heal
we cross the boundary
to a land set aside.

No one may dwell
till or spoil
all souls are travelers
in faint procession
sun customers
image slavers
disciples of health
pass in succinct greeting
carrying neither pot
scythe sword nor pillow.

Only signal carriers to transform
each inching saga
footfall discovery
to tale-breeding annals.

Tall-grown ancient sentinels
watch our progress
the plain of abundance
spreads beneath our feet
kingdom of stillness
separates our troubled wisdom
from the regimen of days.