"Riders of Kaneonuskatew" by Carly Koenig

I watch the cockfighters and Spitzhaubens scratch at the loam
peck and claw
until shards of sunlight prickle out of the ground,
tossed aside instead of worms
now treats for magpies.

The guttural noises of dairy goat and hair sheep are stuck on tattoo
and the old man’s loud Albanian voice never ceases.
There’s always that weird growl from the community well--
haven’t figured that out yet, but the neighborhood boys?
They say it eats toads.

All I know is the old man’s goats are copper deficient;
their tails are like fish spines.
Seems eerie,
like Death managed to nip their tails
before they outwitted him
as goats are prone.
Seems eerier with the clouds gathering over Ana’s wheat fields.

There’s always something fresh to the air here,
but it’s manure and monsoon.
Like beets: dirt into dirt.
People die every year, cramped up in their houses (breathing stale air)
or struck by lightning in the field,
but rain smells delicious.

Then there’s the buzz of it in the air before--like now--
and I think of the birds sitting on the old zapit poles.
Bigger than you, but it can’t touch you,
can’t hurt you.
Miles and miles away.

Everything is miles and miles away, until it isn’t.
It’s why no one here wants to leave: here they can be afraid.
They can jerk away when the traveling book salesman coughs,
and it’s all right.
Small town small-minds, scared of shadows and the prince of darkness.
Really actually scared of wolves and plague, which is written right into their bones.

We live on top of bones here, too; they float up with those monsoons.
We can’t forget, so I watch the kaneonuskatew
watch with the same sunken, pallid eyes
as those around me.

The book salesman said the name came from some Canadians,
some people called Cree I’ve never heard of--
when I said so, he said that the riders are the reason--
and that the name fits.
“One that walks on four claws,” he said, giddy.
They have four feet with four claws on back, but six front.
Bodies like horses,
tails like those goats,
teeth like musk deer,
and feet like witch familiars.

Strange, strange, like the sounds from the well.
But like the boys feed toads to the well’s citizen,
old men think of how the increased grip of claw in loam
would make plowing the hills easier.

I don’t care about the kaneonuskatew.
I care about their riders.