I went into the Maverick Bar

In Farmington, New Mexico.

And drank double shots of bourbon

backed with beer.

My long hair was tucked up under a cap

I’d left the earring in the car.

Two cowboys did horseplay

by the pool tables,

A waitress asked us

where are you from?

a country-and-western band began to play

“We don’t smoke Marijuana in Muskokie”

And with the next song,

a couple began to dance.

They held each other like in High School dances

in the fifties;

I recalled when I worked in the woods

and the bars of Madras, Oregon.

That short-haired joy and roughness—

America—your stupidity.

I could almost love you again.

We left—onto the freeway shoulders—

under the tough old stars—

In the shadow of bluffs

I came back to myself,

To the real work, to

“What is to be done.”

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