Artwalk POETRY and ART

Sherman Falls

Like molten steel, white water pours down
across mossy grey scarp face.
Strength in its fall.

Rectilinear rock once quarried in blocks for stone
houses and factories. Falls elsewhere powered mills
in an earlier time, producing flour and other
commodities. This one never harnessed. Untamed.

Era of steel-fired economic growth produced notable
industrial leader: founder of a foundry, iron-willed
Frank Sherman. This waterfall is named for him.

Water rushes out from treed greenery above,
surges between regimented ranks of stratified rock.
          Foams over fallen, broken blocks below.
Power, named for a man of influence and power.

Reminds me of another Sherman, another time and place.
Ruthless General’s sweep through Georgia gave war
to end slavery a new face: leading bluecoats in an unchecked
blaze, he laid a countryside to waste, weakening separated

opposition greys. A later generation named a tank for him.
          “War is hell!” the General’s pithy take on brutal days
that humbled a Confederacy, tumbled an obdurate social
structure, left stubborn adherents to old ways awash in grief.

Visit the Carnegie Gallery web site: www.carnegiegallery.org