Equality Before the Law

*





Let’s go to Nebraska, where no one wants to go.

We could drink whiskey until the lights go out

and stumble into the dirt street mumbling

about salvation.



And after that we could sit in the dark, touching

since we couldn’t see. And I would say your name,

because when you answered, I would see you there

trusting and poor.



Maybe we could start a farm. We would grow

everything that doesn’t need water. We could starve

in our shack, and when the rain finally came

it would pour right through the roof.



We could get bitter. We could curse our friends

and neighbors. We could pick fights with salesmen

passing by. We could blame the government, and

Mr. Purcell at the bank.



Let’s build a fence with splinters so anyone

who touches it gets hurt. Let’s get a dog that

bites us and keep him in the yard in case anyone

thinks to visit.



And after that we could turn to crime. We could

rob anything you can think of, and kill anyone you like

and then throw the money in the street. We wouldn’t

need it because by then they’d be after us.



Maybe we could find an abandoned warehouse

to have the big stand-off. They’d know

we were there. They’d feel it.

We would make a lot of widows,

and orphans too I guess.



I’d kiss you before my blood ran out into the cracked

dry ground, and take as many with me as I could,

because they didn’t know how I love you

and that should cost them something.

 
 
                                 
 
                                                  -Brent Allard

Mourning the Old Ways

*




The insolence of the mockingbird

calls the sun

to rising

with one sour note

of greeting.



Hills made of purple and red

stretch without limit-

not a hint of ending.

“Awful things were born here,”

their majesty whispers,

“and giants risen up

from the soil.”



Their voices filled the country.

Their afternoon songs

filled the spans between vistas

with intoxicating syrup.

Their instruments pulled notes

from the air for the earth.



The wolf returns home

for the plains’ ample

feast; colors of sky

and earth and water,

digests the splendor,

gives back

a low howling.



They are gone,

no music

falters in agony

falls on red hills

Only a sharp lament;

“the day is over,”

then the silence.




                         

                           -Brent Allard

previously published in Sahara