They were scattered to the wind,
cousins of my sapient ancestors.
Could they speak in poetry?
Find signs in the heavens?
I care for the many that made me.
The joy and misery of my soul
is theirs.
Neanderthal boys looking on mastodons.
Sapient boys following them.
Sweet faces,
drawn from the hard surface of earth.
Mothers hiding them in the brush.
Feeding their children
fruit and meat of the seasons.
Beget and beget through eons.
Link by link, a fragile chain
of intelligence and love.
This hand that writes their poem
is theirs.
This heart that searches for its place
is theirs.
This love that shelters who I love
is theirs.
Neanderthals and me,
I have stories to tell
around your fire.
Redemption and terrible wars.
The sea tide that took your
tribe away.
Extinguished your hearts and hands.
The dispassion of nature
that bred us both.
Your journey up to me
writing down in words
what makes us both.
To this unimaginal time,
this epoch foreign to your eyes.
Your tens of thousands,
who wander the byways
of my mourning.
I have a place for you
inside me.
At the edge of shores
here, and yet to come,
where I will whisper
poems to you,
Neanderthal brothers,
sapient family.