Ghost Town

The clanking sound of spurs, the sun’s glare off the shiny doppelganger derringers. Her hat tipped onto her sweating brow. “Contests! We don’t need no stinking contests!” Her cowhide boots kick up the prairie dust. She’s not your quintessential grandmother. Her torrential windpipe words ready for a fight. “I will be number one! Like it or not!” She spits tobacco into the air, daring a challenge, and it drops at the feet of the biggest contest. “Chew on that one...for a while!” A patch over one green eye, the jealous one. She wears it as a badge of honor. No one messes with Lady Cogburn. Like showing off pictures of her family, she lets a scroll roll loose. Her adjectives and verbs, nouns and sounds. “I dare anyone to steal my verse! Who's brave enough to roll out one of their own!” She spits and stares them down, as one courageous chick steps forward and just as quick she lays her low. “Contests! We don’t need no stinking contests! Now the rest of you scram!” Dodge City, the ghost town, has one occupant. She lights her Virginia Slims, lets her poetic smoke circle the air — like vultures. 7/20/2018 Contests! We don’t need no stinking contests! Poetry Contest Sponsored by: John Lawless