Billions in property lines
Child hostages
John Candy and male stripping?
Owners of school holsters
Ama Jewish norigins
Watered ears kneeling
Complicated boarding times
And unfinished conversations
When and won't
Built a school
Running out of jobs together
American Debts we can't shove
Out of the paperwork
it not in the way you make a man
even the quality of living is unstable
new zealanders are flooding into thousand oaks like
similar valleys for the corruption entrees
soo many spill outs from the economic offerings
please bring the handsome warrior of sex with!
amazing
the spending habituals of teenage frolicking
60-80 and 90 year old rotted l death ven diagram
oasis retreat me never gossip gotherians
and the make a move already boys with holsters attache me now
The cowboys always won
The Indians always lost
I yearned to see a cowboy
with an arrow through his chest
But then I read a story 'bout
a cowboy who'd been scalped
Promised to myself, I said
Now I'd see a red man dead
Put on two toy store holsters
Courage blazing from their guns
Bagged me the bony remnants
Of a graveyard skeleton
Blood-curdling Scene ~
Happy Halloween!
two cell phones ran into each other on some street
friends I think world has changed though
and stood side by side known yet unknown
an awkward greeting then sliding into silence
like an old western gunfight suddenly
a duet of ring tones that has taken music hostage
they reached for their souls lost in a maze
to see who had the quickest draw
and to their relief a touching moment
quickly typing with insane joy
their thoughts playing the keys like a piano
in the end they acknowledged each other with a nod
with a good-bye slipped it back into their holsters
patting it like a baby's bottom waiting for the burp
they walked for a moment but like a pack of cigarettes
they reached for their cell phones lighting and inhaling
staring at the screen to see if their popularity was still intact
as they were staring downwards the cell phone they were tweeting
walked by without a peep just a nod
(In memory of the 19 children and two adults killed by gun violence in Uvalde, Texas on May 24, 2022…as well as the countless others who have and who will suffer similar fates.)
Firearm Requiem
By Mark Stucky
In the U.S., guns outnumber people
and sales outpace population growth.
Guns under beds.
Guns in closets.
Guns in cars.
Guns in trucks.
Guns in purses.
Guns in holsters.
Guns in forests.
Guns in offices.
Guns in classrooms.
Guns here.
Guns there.
Guns everywhere.
Guns pointing at them.
Guns pointing at me.
Guns pointing at you.
Why let so many fingers on so many triggers?
Why protect guns more than lives of children?
Why choose gun wrongs over gun laws?
Why is America the monarch of mass shootings?
Did gun rights come from Mt. Sinai,
written by God’s own fingers?
Did (not) guns (once again)
make America great(ly pained)?
When will we as a nation
collectively have courage
to save generational blood
and beat guns into plowshares?
(First published in Agape Review, 15 June 2022. See also my poems “Hate Vacuuming” and “Weapons of Wonder.”)
Elephant trunk palms column, canopy claps hands
Undergrowth glad heart shape leaves spiral
Navigator vines map branches, brace boa banyan
Utile duenna diary with my duties conspiring
Chaperone rope binds silent beside my grand plan
Helpmaster holsters my faltering stride, hips squared
Essential weapon for war against mediocrity
Netted fruit bag binds ideas, ripe inspiration shared
Collaboration binges exchanges evocatively
Oversees growth, buffers fumbles, humiliation spared
Unbias advisor straddles drama, miniscule mosquitos
Raised beyond current, stilts lift clear of silt
Above ravaging river, twig leg log cabin cosy kudos
Guileless sunrise server castrates lumpy guilt
Enmeshed mirror wishes bud symmetrical smiling rose
Mentor each moment monitor prods my furtive dreams
Enlivens rainblur haze, unravels twisted maze
Narrows channel between now and zany zone supreme
Twines possible to present, pours zesty praise
Strengthened, gender invalid, my meridian self esteem
9th June
Carbonised Agenda
It’s high noon in Armadillo Texas Sheriff cat announced in her way.
Her sidekick, Deputy Mouse Whiskers smiled and decided to stay.
They strapped on cowboy hats, holsters, belt buckles and a gun.
It was 1959, when outlaws were arrested, and TV westerns were fun.
Just before Christmas 2021
A historic wind storm
Setting a new norm
Swept across us all
Continental Divide sigh
I told you so
Tornadoes spun from Minnesota snow
Blew out a Kentucky candle factory
Days before
Tropical hurricane here in Michigan
My lit up life-size Christmas bear
Wobbled around the bare backyard
Side to side
Like an old man on bad hips
Or a bow-legged cowboy
Hands on holsters
Pacing steps to the final showdown
I draw
In shorts T-Shirt and Birkenstocks
Santa cap
He howls to the ground
Upside down
Shaking in the foreboding wind.
As I ride across the high desert plains
an open, arid scenery whisks by.
The sun is heating up rippled windows
on the railroad train, as it jostles riders
to jiggle, jerk and sway
to the click, clack of wooden tracks
towards Tucumcari, New Mexico
Gateway To The West.
Sounds of the Old Wild West
stir up the imagination
like the great train robbery
of Black Jack Ketchum in 1897
near Tucumcari, where he and his bandits
secretly hid their stash of gold
long before the train whistle
blew near the station.
Clickity clack, or could that be horses’ hooves
galloping alongside the old train tracks?
As desert dust kicks up, I envision ghosts of riders
wild west cowboys catching up
with guns out of holsters
shouting, “Stop the train! Get the gold!”
“Next stop, Tucumcari!”calls the conductor
I am shaken out of my daydream and look around.
Humble buildings huddle within the arroyos
people proud of their Southwestern heritage
for here in the desert you’ll not find a heartier folk
than those who live within this great land
of grit and sizzling sun.
You couldn't rattle Tex
Ice water in his veins
No one ever saw him wince
let alone complain
Kept to himself, he did
Felt life was meant to be hard
Carried his lasso and holsters proud
Tackled fool rustlers, no holds barred
The range was his home, an honest calling
One where he gave his cattle free rein
'Til sundown was nigh, when he'd change his tune
Call in his options, by the light of the moon
Came a day when his ten-gallon hat
No longer was seen on the range, working at
The craft that he loved, more than life itself
Tex had roped his last steer, put his reins on the shelf
Baku
In Baku ( the then Soviet Union)
I found the individual Russians a friendly people
we drank white wine which was a bit sweet
but otherwise tasted good.
The restaurant looked like 1930 had a white table clothes
of course, Lenin and Stalin were looking at us
either as a bust or a picture.
The suits the men wore was also 1930ish but so what
we didn´t have to pay.
The Russians liked to hear theirs was a wonderful country
as I indeed did in, say, Texas wonderful state
and was told the blacks were all communists
Strangely enough, I was more frightened in Texas, so many
guns in holsters.
The individual Texans were polite, well-armed men often are
and we drank lone star beer served cold.
The British took years before serving cold lager.
I live in Portugal now, a good place but I wouldn't say I like the unholy alliance between politicians and the business class.
Steampunk Maggie with her flaming purple neon hair
Showing a gung-ho attitude that scares men off the planet.
Guns should be hanging off her holsters; not sure they aren’t.
As she faces me down with her charisma I laugh. She is mighty!
I add some yellow daisies to her top hat to smooth her out, calm her.
Rather than softening her attitude, it makes her more formidable.
I adore her now more than ever.
Where are your holsters?
I don’t have any.
Where do you keep your guns?
I don’t have any.
What is wrong with you?
Lots of things.
He gives me a smirk.
Seconds later….
Do you have knives?
This is asked hopefully.
Sure.
Where are they?
I stare at this four-year-old I agreed to watch for a few hours.
Why do you want to know?
I want to be able to defend myself.
From who?
The bad guys?
What bad guys?
The BAD GUYS that are everywhere.
Let’s swing, Want to?
No. I want my tablet.
Why?
So I can kill bad guys.
I hid the tablet after a bit, so he was forced to swing and slide.
He professed to hate it, as he went down the slide giggling like a hyena.
Shots fired
In a western town
Smoke clears
From the barrel of a gun
Two arch rivals
In a duel of death
Who's the better gunslinger
Will be put to the test
Bullets fly
On a mission to kill
Only the Bulls-eye shooter
Holsters his weapon again
Sheriff falls
To bite the dust
A cowboy escapes
Trailed by bounty hunters and hounds
A reward is set
On church walls and saloons
"Wanted dead or alive"
Reports Tombstone daily news
The Gunfighter
By: Tom Wright
1997
I knoweth not
From whence he came.
He just appeared
He gave us no name.
He had close-set eyes
That gave but a glance.
Immediately I knew
I had no chance.
The tied off holsters
He wore on his hips.
Held two forty-fives
With faux pearl grips.
His hat-shaded brow
Held beaded sweat.
His trip into Dodge
Was to settle a bet.
With a drawl he then said
I've come to see.
If It’s like I've heard
That you're as fast as me.
Then at twenty paces
Both solemn faced.
We each knew soon
One would be erased.
We both drew and fired
At the count of three.
Then I felt a sharp sting
As his bullet struck me.
While I searched for blood
With his drawl he spoke.
Pick yourself up old man
It was only a joke.
From the ground I arose
Having but little to say.
For this strangers gun
Was quickest today.
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