Alice Folkart
Share Cropper's Dreams
The fantasy
was always the same
for Harry,
he'd be a big shot
in a big city,
cigar,
long, black car
and a blond,
what a chest.
Like the best he'd seen
at the movies in Henderson
where everyone got shot
at the end.
Got back
to bend
as he hoed
in the hot sun,
rucking up
the dun dry dirt,
just enough
to rip up weedy roots,
tear them speedy
out of moist black earth
and lay them back
so wind could suck them dry.
Everyone of them
died at the end too.
Even after
he moved to town
and then to a city
and then another
and then L.A.,
the fantasy there
was still the same,
corn and beans, all his,
far as he could see,
his own John Deere
stead of old mules
and Mexicans,
working for almost nothing,
busy with their own fantasies,
hoeing in the August sun.
Just like he remembered,
only better.
Hope to God
that they don't
all die at the end too.
round XI, poem 3, 13 January 2006
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| Alice Folkart's
poetry has appeared in Niederngasse's Marginalia, the Judd's Hill
Winery 2006 Poetry Journal (juried), and will be appearing in the
spring issue of Mindfire; short stories have been published by Long
Story Short and Nights and Weekends. email: ajfolkart@mfire.com |
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