The Sentinel Coyote

The Sentinel Coyote
by
Tingster & The Coyotitos

(Verse 1)
I roam the sands where borders bleed in dusk,
Under the orange halo of a broken sun.
My paws imprint the dust of vanished hope,
Each grain a memory of those who came before.
In the hush between wind and stone
I hear the sighs of distant feet
That once crossed rivers, deserts, walls—
Ghost-voices crying: “You must belong.”

(Chorus)
I am the sentinel coyote,
Watcher of the shifting line.
Between exile and home,
Between hunger and fear,
My howl carries their question
Into the rafters of night:
“Who builds the cage,
Who holds the key?”

(Verse 2)
They send armies of paper, law, and steel —
To snatch the unmarked, the silent, the unarmed.
They deport shadows, drag hope through gates,
Claiming virtue in chains.
In Georgia’s fields they storm factories —
Four hundred souls tangled in machinery and fear.
In California’s greenhouses they raided night’s long dream,
One fell, one vanished, two hundred more bound.
They claim criminals, but detain the innocent —
More held with no record than those they call “guilty.”

(Chorus)
I am the sentinel coyote,
Watcher of the shifting line.
Between exile and home,
Between hunger and fear,
My howl carries their question
Into the rafters of night:
“Which law justifies
This violence of dust?”

(Bridge)
They fly drones overhead,
Eyes in the sky tracking your breath.
They deputize the guard,
Let soldiers snatch souls at the border.
They build acts named for victims,
Then wield them like swords (Laken Riley Act).
They sue cities for sanctuary,
Then cast blame in broken poems.

In darkness’s mirror I see the law’s shadow,
A scorpion’s stinger in a gilded hand.
They write statutes to confine the lost,
But forget the earth remembers every footfall.

(Verse 3)
Once, hope was a river, wide and forgiving.
Now it dries under the weight of red tape and fear.
Still, I prowl between fences,
Between desert and the steel horizon,
Carrying the names of the vanished
Like bones in my belly.

If justice is a song,
Let it be the wind’s plaintive cry,
Not the slam of bars,
Not the shuttered gate.

(Final Chorus)
I am the sentinel coyote,
Watcher of the shifting line.
Between exile and home,
Between hunger and fear,
My howl spins a warning
Into the bones of night:
“Remember — the desert does not forget
The footsteps of the lost.”

(Coda)
And when the border lines seep into sand,
When the fences rust to ruin,
Maybe then our children will see
That no one crosses the line
Who does not carry home within.