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POETRY

Dastardly

Weston Richey

no-good son
   of a gun, low-
      down in cheap
         dusty black
            dollar-suit,
               even the evening
            redness frowns
         on damsel tied
      to train tracks, razor
   mustache, malevolent
horse hooves
   dynamiting earth
      from robbed
         desert plans.
            Nothing good
               emerges, glinting
                  like God himself
               shat gold,
            from schemes
         shaped like this
      one, though
   of course you
know all this—
   have to know,
      else why crane
         a thick-sin
            fed neck shaded
               by bowler, looking
                  toward Thieves’ Landing,
                     then Tumbleweed,
                  anywhere, everywhere
               the cowboy,
            a beauty in beige
         hide chaps, might
      come from to save
   a poor soul
again, to do you
   in again, hogtied
      & jailbound?
         This dance
            must be
               the hundredth,
                  or the thousandth.
                     Which body
                        have you stolen
                     to see him
                  this time?
               America
            stretches out,
         a big yawn,
      as cracked dirt
   & roasting cacti
waking from sleep,
   dreamless, no care,
      seeing only empty
         expanse in the mirror.
            There is no place
               else but this cliff
                  over Red Rock,
                     over a bloody
                        land entranced
                           by itself,
                        to really see
                     another man,
                  how his mouth
               moves without
            bandana, how skin
         calluses & sweats
      outside leather gloves.
   Repeat that
as many times
   as you need
      & someday
         it’ll come true.
            Repeat that
               until the cowboy
                  comes home
                     after a long day,
                        tells you about
                           the broncos
                              he broke, asks
                           after your day’s
                        villainy, holds
                     your hand
                  like a lasso.

Weston Richey is a writer and academic. Weston earned a BA in philosophy and English from New York University and an MFA in creative writing from Rutgers University—Newark, and is now a PhD student in English at The University of Texas at Austin. Weston’s work has appeared elsewhere in Pigeon Pages, Strange Horizons, and FreezeRay Poetry.
Author Photo of Weston Richey

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