The title of the poem is Mud on the Horn. Fair warning that nothing good will follow.
The only way to get mud on a saddle horn is for the horse to have fallen and rolled on the rider. The author doesn’t tell us about the wreck, other than to say he/she is going to catch the horse, rub him down, pen him in a safe place, and calm the trembling caused by the clatter of a helicopter. From this we’re pretty sure it was an accidental fall, not a buck off. Chances are they were after a critter that broke away and needed to be back in the herd. Horse stepped in a badger hole or turned back too short, and went down. Nobody at fault, it can happen anytime, and often does. We do know the saddle horn didn’t pierce the rider’s gut, otherwise there would be blood, instead of mud. But the rider lay unmoving until the chopper arrived, so it’s obviously bad.
The companion knows that if the rider awakes in some sterile room, her first thought will be for the animal she loves and trusts. She’ll want to know it was cared for and watched for any injuries, curried, and spoken to with love. Her friend stays busy with repairing the equipment to keep her mind off dreadful possibilities. The bridle is intact, but the reins are beyond fixing so she snaps a set of her own reins on the bridle; an act of faith that there will be other days of riding together. It’s all she can do besides pray, but she knows that God’s eye is on the sparrow and she commits one more sparrow to his care.
The best writers know to show, not tell. Betty Lynne McCarthy has shown us all of it and never told a fact. I doubt anyone who reads her poem will keep a dry eye. Those of us who know horse work also know the truth of my daughter’s comment. Someone will have to do the small acts that remain, knowing that the next time we put a foot in a stirrup it could be us. And yet, we ride on.
A new year stretches before us; a map of the unknown. We approach it with hope and, often fear and trembling. And hopefully, with prayer. We are all just sparrows, but God’s eye is on us.
Ride on.