by Leonore Hildebrandt
When waxing philosophical
about the older days,
a good miller has no reason to say
it’s been a Western aberration
to grant rights to foreign workers.
But this one does?
After colonizing,
this miller wants to decolorize,
to remake the country
pallid, blanched, white.
To keep the lowest caste,
a dispensable underclass.
There’s no life in it.
A young boy blenches in fear.
These mean words will be milled––
crushed and ground.
Washed out, they'll be left to fade
about the older days,
a good miller has no reason to say
it’s been a Western aberration
to grant rights to foreign workers.
But this one does?
After colonizing,
this miller wants to decolorize,
to remake the country
pallid, blanched, white.
To keep the lowest caste,
a dispensable underclass.
There’s no life in it.
A young boy blenches in fear.
These mean words will be milled––
crushed and ground.
Washed out, they'll be left to fade
like the bones bleaching in the desert.
Leonore Hildebrandt has published four collections of poetry: Somewhere the Day Begins, The Work at Hand, The Next Unknown, and Where You Happen to Be. Her poems and translations appeared in the Beloit Poetry Journal, Cafe Review, Cerise Press, Cimarron Review, Denver Quarterly, Harpur Palate, New Letters, Plant Human Quarterly, Poetry Daily, Poetry Salzburg Review, Rhino, and Sugar House Review among other journals. Nominated several times for a Pushcart Prize, she was a finalist for the Maine Writers and Publishers Award in Poetry in 2024. Originally from Germany, Leonore is an editor, gardener, song-writer, and musician, spending her time in Harrington, Maine, and Silver City, NM.
