Livy's Horses
by Anne Whitehouse

"I had one true love,
And I lost him.
He left me for Jana.
She did me a favor;
He and I couldn't live together;
We would have destroyed each other.

"When he was dying of cancer,
I was the one she called.
She and I took care of him.

"Twelve years ago
I came to Santa Fe
With two horses,
And I'll be leaving like that, too.
Before I found a house,
I found a stable;
I'll do it again in Fort Collins.

"I love the alpacas,
But I'm giving them up.
This past winter was hard-
Twenty-eight inches of snow
And no roads plowed.
I'm sixty years old;
I can't do this much longer.
Besides, I never liked it here-
Too liberal for me."

Slender, still beautiful,
Livy roams the fields
With her dog Jill,
A white Great Pyrenees.
After Blossom died
From the difficult birth,
The cria stillborn, too,
Livy took Jill with her
Into the wilderness
And cried. And cried.

"It will break my heart
To leave Jill­,
But she can't live
Without her herd."

The things of Livy's life
Are blowing away
Like blossoms in springtime.
Soon they will be gone
Like desert snows.
Except for the horses.
She'll keep the horses.

Copyright © 1999-2007 by Amarillo Bay. All rights reserved.
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