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Cowboys and Indians Picture remembered: my mother, in pin-curled hair, tall like shadows in a valley, stands on the back porch holding the threadspool handle of the wooden screen door in one hand, hurling, with the other, one dish after another at my father's taunting face. No sound remembered. Just his laughing face and the dishes sailing smooth like horseshoes in a friendly game until they shatter in the rock pile. Angry clatter. I'm drawn back by sun and shadow and the bloom of rose of Sharon to my waiting place, hiding from my outlaw brother in the gorge below. My tobacco stick horse bears rough saw ridges, swirls, and long strawy filaments of unraveled baling twine, his rein. The flower at eye level is pink and white, a droopy, velvety, deep-dish tulip flower, hidden among rough, serrated leaves, seen clearly. —Carolyn Reams Smith Countryside Going Past Jewelweed in the ditch Goldenrod blooming by the road Double yellow line House hazed in fog Mailbox with its flag down Curve that's hard to take Barn Pond Stop sign You don't want to know where I'm going. You don't get an explanation. Highway leading to the next county Entry ramp onto the freeway Pavement going to the city. —Nancy Simpson To Bixby Creek Again and to You, Raccoon Shocked awake by the half-nail moon jabbing deep into the canyon. So bright I felt an unnamed fear in my gut. Fell back to sleep as the moon traced the sky. Woke again near dawn to your perfect footprint on the misted window— like burning lace. Thanks again, masked partner and fellow poet for sharing in the night's crime, whatever it was. And let's not let those bastards catch us. —William Witherup 59 ...

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