They’re tearing down the racetrack for condos.
There was a heyday, not long ago,
when banners flew from the cupolas,
and fluorescent riding silks snapped
in the wind of pursuit.

Little whips cracked against shorthaired necks,
and the earth thundered under dozens of hooves.
Money-crazed cheers spewed from excitable throats
surrounded by the smell of stale spilt beer
and the confetti of ripped tickets.

Bettors, not just fat men with sweat-stained shirts and cigars,
but lawyers, grandmothers, firemen, single-minded,
watched these fine-muscled animals
careen around the far turn,
going nose-to-nose.

Some famous names left their prints on that track –
Seattle Slew, once –
but most are gone now, out to pasture.
Sometimes the wind through the gates recalls a whinny
or the distant huff of an impatient filly.

Once the old wooden grandstand burnt to the ground –
I could see black smoke from forty miles away –
and fire spread to the stables. Sixty horses were lost.
At night some say you can hear their screams.
But rebuilt, this place ran for twenty-five more years.

Today, suburban sprawl has finally claimed this ground,
as has the shift to other recreations.
Yellow bulldozers plow through red stable walls,
arrogant little machines whose diesel engines
are still measured by how many horses’ work they can do.

11/07/2001

Posted on 11/07/2001
Copyright © 2026 Bruce W Niedt