Lost Boys of the Upper Great Plains, and: Lost Boys of the Upper Great Plains, and: Lost Boys of the Upper Great Plains

Lost Boys of the Upper Great Plains

Every six feet of three-deep ditch,we clatter downour shovels & go shoveour heads

in the horse trough. Sometimes,even though he tells me

not to, I open my eyesin there. Columns of algae,trusses of alkali

& rust, & oncethe bones

of a rat or a kitten or whatever—the bones anyway beautiful

in the rotlight.

Lost Boys of the Upper Great Plains

Why every year we goto the Miles City Bucking Horse Sale & Rodeo,I’ll never know

though roll a drunk clown& you’ve got enoughfor burgers & dilly bars at the Dairy Queen,or a round of poppers at whatever sad saloon will have you,

or a godblessed handle& two Gatorades blue as angels—

enough to whirl & black

six or so hours& beneath the arms of a cottonwoodwake

on the gravel by the pissing creek, starslittle nails in your night-eyes, blood

all over your mouthlike you got hit or bit someone,& no shoes. Your heartwhangs. Just fucking whangs.

How’d you loseyour shoes?

Lost Boys of the Upper Great Plains

Out of St. Regis I wave downa white-haired Indianin a Ford pickup& have to ride in the bed,like when we were just goddamn kids

we rode everywhere,& by everywhere

I mean nowhere,I mean by five hundred milesI’m farther now than I have ever been—

each mountain the green face of God,each river deep & clear as prayer,

so I bang on the back windowuntil he lets me out, even waitsthe old fool, while I strip & from a trestle leapinto a pool so cold

it hurts my teeth, so coldI can’t sleep or all the way

to Spokane stop from grinning. Spokane,where the Indian buys me a burger& shakes my hand.

City wind then,gutters strung with broken soda cups,

a baby stroller with three wheelsin the verge weeds. That way,a tire place. This way,the Goodwill. I told Lacy

I’d write, & sogo this way. In Spokane, I guess,I’ll do the things I say I will.