I left a little girl out on the trail,

Like a college kid who without consideration 

Takes on a dog, only to wind up

Leaving it back home with the parents.

I thought I could retrace the steps of my ancestors

All the way from Alabama to Talequa.

I tried to tell the story, but couldn't finish the job.

And people wanted to know!

They asked me, "What happened to the little Indian girl?"

But I couldn't bring myself to tell them

That her mother died out there,

And the people who took her in abused her.

They molested that little girl,

And she ran away and married a soldier.

She changed her name

And never spoke a word of Cherokee again,

In fact, she hardly ever said a word of any kind again, at all.

I tried to tell her story for her, but I failed.

I found the forced march much too much for me.

Sometimes my heart flies along the path they took

And gets lost out there.

Sometimes when I go, I get molested out there, too, by demons,

And sometimes, I die, just like the little girl's mother.

-jenn