A JUDGE OF CATTLE

She knew absolutely nothing about judging cattle,

but there she sat, bare-breasted,

on a bale of hay in a livestock barn

at the Cleburne County Fair.

She watched the parade of steers

and cheered 4-H boys to victory.

Few knew her mission there,

but every August,

Queenie Hawthorne came

to stroll the midway

and sit in cattle barns.

Her skin was parched by summer's sun

and days of hoeing corn.

Her lipstick, much too much

for one her age;

her sequined shoes,

too stylish for a fair.

Her once-short auburn hair

streamed half way down her back now,

lilting in the breeze.

When she got tense,

she wrapped it around her fingers

and spit a lot.

Always during judging.

She was a friendly sort

and seemed to know most folks,

folks who wondered how she got there,

where she lived

and if she worked.

But those things did not matter.

What mattered was

that the Cleburne County Fair

came every August

and Queenie Hawthorne was there

to perch on a bale of hay.



- Harding Stedler 2001

The P.S.

I live in the city where you died,
but no one dares to recall your visage
pooling in the precipice of hoarded grief.
Your shadow has me by my throat--
the page a scaffold trembling.
I dangle fishing lines in question rivers,
worms so hard to fiddle with,
knowing I am stirring chili
way too hot for tongues to touch.
Gloves of silence easier
than pitchforks in an open wound.
The text is missing from the white
and so I build you in mind:
glamorous, incisive wit, marching for
causes of lingering pain,
the way all nurses must have done.

When they severed my leg
above my knee, did you bleed too?
Run hangers down my body cast
to scratch an itch you knew was there?
I've flattered your fortune
with my dreams. Imagine you
that shiny tip of unicorns in fairy tales.
Driven by ache, I turn you,
wind you like a music box.
I make you into Faberge's in chicken coops
of ordinary days and nights.
In the P.S. of a tear, you are my yolk.
Shell is gone but center stays.
I ask my father how you liked
your morning eggs. He can't recall.
It is the wont of unmet want.
He cannot see through wasted blood,
to answer this bell, this chime, this
waterfall, this orchestra,
this orphanage of heritage.
Paper is a face-less grave.


For Margaret Kurtz Buck



Syringes

That last summer confused me.
Your flesh thin as a Persian hair ball
crawling in soft candle wax.
"Dusting is a waste of time;
put down rags and sit with me!"
You wanted to have tea
before lunch, as if the clock
would never reach that number 12.
"It just might rain;
let's have it on the patio.
Clouds deserve a saucer too."
Every death a virgin vigil
pulling up a planted flower.

Your readiness to face the snuff
like potpourri gets laid in drawers--
it made me itch, pace the kitchen
cleaning counters. Banking on
that busyness all women use
to box a heavyweight of truth.
I laughed and set the china up.
Brittleness and chipping cups--
cosmic and inevitable.
I wished your bones weren't
borrowed wicks nearing flaming destinies.
Wanting to contain the storm,
my body chattered nervously.
I was six years old once more,
staring at a full syringe.


- Janet Buck 2001