Through the long Pleistocene, when days and stars
lacked names and our ancestors slept in caves,
cats with scimitar fangs patrolled the dark,
their lumbering shadows haunting the mouths
of shelters where families huddled at fires,
chipping at stones, painting beasts on the walls,
inventing religion.
Fifty millennia on, the indoor climate steady
at seventy-two, we trust to cameras and dead bolts,
shotguns and godly behavior. Tooth and claw are
memories, mostly, now. And yet I awaken still
in the pre-dawn gloom, wondering if that distant
whine is a passing train or exuberant coyotes
closing on prey.
A Brief History of Troglodytes by Tad Tuleja | Sandalwood Poetry Reed Diffuser
$20.00Price
Tad Tuleja is an American folklorist and songwriter who is fascinated by the tension between domesticity and wildness. The author of thirty books, he holds a Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Texas and has taught writing at Harvard, Princeton, and the University of Oklahoma. His poetry has appeared in Adirondack Review, Urthona, Blue Unicorn, and The Road Not Taken. His website is http://www.tadtuleja.com
