This poem is spillover from the April 20, 2021 Bonus Fishbowl. It was inspired by prompts from janetmiles and fuzzyred . It also fills the "Feathers" square in my 6-1-20 card for the Cottoncandy Bingo fest. This poem has been sponsored by janetmiles . It belongs to the Daughters of the Apocalypse series. It is the first in a set of three, followed by " Don't Let the Grass Grow " and "On the Path of Friendship." "The Little Shadow Across the Grass" [0 A.E. / Roll Up] When the End came, it wasn't nearly as bad on the Blackfeet Reservation as it was in most places. They lost a few people who had been out shopping when the bombs fell and the Grunge killed off most of the adults, rolling up the world as the old Ghost Dance said. Kalispell and Great Falls were hit, but nothing in Glacier County was big enough to be worth bombing. Some tribe members who were out at the End or lived elsewhere made it back to the reservation. Several of them brought parakeets or macaws for Nadie Bird Feathers, who raised those for their colorful feathers used in some regalia. Few people would be able to care for them anymore, and then there would be no getting new ones. The main challenge was that the End cut off the supplies. It wasn't safe to travel, so most folks stayed put. Now there was no way to get replacements for anything, and nobody to buy whatever people had to sell. Nadie's granddaughter Kanti Young to Go In was upset because her husband Abraham Come Back had lost all his relatives in Great Falls, but they and their daughter Reba Girl Across River were safe here on the reservation. Jane Lecompte Fine Gun Woman had somehow escaped an attack that largely wiped out her unit, and she'd come home to warn her people that things were really falling apart for good. It could have been worse, but it was challenging enough. Nadie took stock of their resources. The Blackfeet had a large reservation with plenty of trees for firewood, so they wouldn't freeze in the cold. They had thousands of cattle and hogs, now without buyers. Nobody was enthusiastic about raising those for personal use, so they'd probably get eaten and the land used for bison. They might keep the dairy, if the Jerseys survived. The sheep and goats were hardy breeds for the most parts, although the Boers probably wouldn't make it without heated barns. Most of the chickens were commercial breeds that wouldn't reproduce well on their own, except for the Rhode Island Reds. There were some private flocks, though, with homestead breeds such as Speckled Sussex and Wyandotte. Nadie's daughter Kimi First Sleep Woman raised Blackfeet Buckeye chickens, not just for eggs and meat, but as devastatingly effective mousers. The local horses were mostly Blackfeet Buffalo Horses, Appaloosas, mustangs, or quarter horses. After the End came, Gerald Evans and Stephanie Kline promptly went horsecatching from opposite ends of the reservation. They came back together, with a spectacular Blackfeet stallion called Storm Going and his band of two dozen assorted mares. They also had an Icelandic stallion that they named Red Medicine Shield and his four mares, given to them by a pair of old farmers who expected to die without their necessary medications. Everyone fussed over the long tails and the flowing double manes. Nadie wasn't too worried about her own family. Her husband Brian Bear Shaking made jigsaw puzzles; there would be no more tourists to buy them, but everyone else would want more entertainment now that the televisions rarely worked. Kimi had her Buckeyes, while her younger sibling Alex Almost a Woman kept herb gardens and honeybees. Nadie's son Aranck Comes at Night did the large-scale farming of hay, wheat, and other field crops. Kimi's daughter Kanti was a gardener, and her husband was determined to learn farming. Abraham could work a radio, though, and that was useful. Other farmers were growing beans, peas, potatoes, safflower -- there was even a pumpkin patch. The Blackfeet Reservation would have no trouble feeding its people. In many places, the roads were choked with refugees, but Montana was so sparsely populated that they didn't have as many. Only the biggest cities of Billings, Missoula, and Great Falls were large enough to generate significant numbers of long-distance refugees, and even Great Falls was so far away that few reached the reservation. Most of those who did were trying to get somewhere else when they got stranded, though a few sought a place to stay. The standard offer was a day's work in exchange for all the dried meat they could carry and enough fuel to get them off of the reservation. If they made it to the end of the day, then the tribe could discuss other options. What Nadie and the other elders were really watching for was whether the land wanted to get a taste of the travelers. They found two good families that way. The first was Jack That Was Fast and his son Jasper, both carpenters. In approaching the brushpile, they grabbed a thorn tree first and got scratched up immediately, which gave them both the new name. The other was Wilma Red Hands and her father Bill. Since he was disabled, she had offered to serve in his place and worked the skin off her hands before anyone even noticed. Nadie looked at the changes around her and realized that more of them were good changes than bad ones. Yes, they had lost a few members and would lose more still when the medicines ran out, but they had gained some people too. More importantly, the Blackfeet were no longer trapped like fish in a floodpool; the whites had lost most of their power. Civilization, like life, was the little shadow which ran across the grass to lose itself in the sunset. But there would always come another dawn. * * * Notes: This poem's notes are long, so the character , setting , and content notes will appear elsewhere.