Even Cowboys Carry Cell Phones

Lucky Says

34 C a r o l G u e r r e r o - M u r p h y Lucky Says One: take this with you, this you cantering bareback, this you I carry across the last green meadow of fall, take yourself this way, and this meadow, and me, into every closed room, take this outdoor you, carry yourself as I carry you, broadly, strong, indoors and as I swerve dangerously out from under you, take yourself laughing, hanging on as I jostle into a trot, take the one who threads her fingers through my coarse mane, take the laughing one, almost falling off, always holding on, crossing autumn’s meadows, take this you laughing into the rooms of winter. Two: I’m in the pasture and oats will arrive one day when you’re through moving things, moving objects here and there, your daughter out of the house, your son back to his plane with his luggage, yourselves in all four directions, cars breaking, bolts and oil raining, carbon shooting out your car’s exhaust as you shuttle objects back and forth between stores and dorm rooms, stores and your homes, meals onto and off tables, candles got out and lit and burned and snuffed, all the while, I’m waiting in the deep grass, eating, and one day you’ll arrive and you’ll be carrying my oats. Three: I’m not the source of this love that sparks soft fireworks between your fingers and my coat. Love spills out of your fingertips brushing mosquitoes, pulling gorse, and scratching, scratching my hide. Love is in the lover, not so much the beloved. I love equally my oats, meadow grass, wet mud on hot days, the mare in the next field, and you brushing out my winter coat until my wild stripes show. ...