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The Significance of the Frontier

J. Quinn Brisben



Lost:1d. keyring medallion
with lathered horses, straining men
in thunderous dust, commemorating
“The Opening of the Cherokee Strip---1893”
with my name and word
“grandson” dimly inscribed on reverse.

End of an Epoch

Now is the asking of untrivial questions:

Why did all the buildings
Have false fronts?


grandmother died
slowly
half a lifetime back
I recall her
sometimes
more clearly
than I want

Upended desks, misdealt books,
Papers deranged on the floor

Who pushed the sidekick
into the water trough?


Semipermanent mementos in crude strokes
Of felt-tip pens on scaly walls:
MIGHTY MIGHTY SYNDICATE ST RANGERS
SPANISH KINGS, nothing taken
Except my keys with the medallion
That bound me to a stiffened past.

grandma
what were you
looking for
that it took you
so long
to die

Safety Valve

Officer Dibbles twirls a billy
Made to his order in our wood shop,
Grins, strokes his gun, and tells me:

“We got no chance of getting back
Your keys and stuff, I know which ones
Done it, but I can’t prove it
Without I crack heads, and you can’t
Do that no more; don’t worry none,”

How did the dusty cowpoke
defeat the crooked sheriff?


“They ain’t thieves; it’s just a thing now
To carry around zillions of keys
Like old time cat burglars; the chief one
That hit you dropped out here last year,
Just now flunked his draft mental,
And your room was handiest to bust.”

at eighty broke her hip
learned to walk again
mixed up past and present
called me by names
of long-dead men

Somewhere a disk of memory flashes,
Dangling proudly like a scalplock.

Who had been stirring up
the savages?


laced her babble
with startling obscenities

saw the dead child
in the glass
replayed scratchy
cowboy records
ceaselessly

What were the Sons of the Pioneers
searching for?


Manifest Destiny

Stash has sprouted up six inches
Dropped his voice an octave, hardened
Superbly since he was my student,
Sergeant Warzynkowski now, he judges me:

“Oh, hell, it don’t bother me none
That you’re a peacenik; you always were
Crazy that way, and we’ll win there
Whether you like it or not;
I know it’s a dirty war, but when
Was there a clean one? And we can’t
Let them turn us back now.”

Why did Great White Father
speak with forked tongue?


“Remember, we used to argue in class
About the colored? Well, you win.
Give them decent treatment andThey’ll kill those yellow commie bastards
As good as anyone; see, I’ve learned.”

she wore us raw
taking care of her
my hate welled up
but still she was
the only root
I had


Moving Line

This line has fourteen for-sale signs
And one porch still jagged from a bombing,
Panic in the air as real as dust.

to blot out her pain
I stared at the tintype
on her dresser
brown and faded
like frost-nipped grass

Fierce-mustached Pappas hales me as I ride:

“Hey, schoolteacher with a cowboy hat,
Come drink ouzo and talk awhile.”

What is behind the whiskers
of the prospector?


“The first time I seen big hat like yours
Was on William S. Hart; him and Charlie Chaplin
Was my first notion of USA; remember,
Charlie et shoes like they was fancy meal;
I laugh like crazy; too bad they don’t let Charlie
Back here no more; he knew us good.”

Why did the Virginian
lynch his best friend?


the young couple stood
with stiff pride
before the low sod house
nothing
between them
and earth’s edge
but waving grass

“A lot of colored people moving in here
But I ain’t moving out; my son,

He want me out in suburbs with him:
I tell him no; any content I get,
I get just as good right here; same thing
Happen out in suburbs pretty soon anyhow.”

they missed bonanzas
again and again
but further west
was another new land
and another

“This world too small to run away in anymore.”

Leveller

Indifferently this bridge spans
A gouge of rigid white concrete,
A blurry torrent of lights and steel.

Who were we heading off
over the pass?


at last harvest
I watched wheat combines
tried to find the place
where the sod house had been
I could see nothing
but machines
Savoring the brief joys of terror,
Boys dance toward the showdown,
The only open gate to manhood.

Why did no one run
from the Alamo?


mother stayed to watch
I went to the movies
she must have died
when Fred Astaire
was dancing

Juggled skyward by a prancing boy,
A stiff-barreled gun glints bloodilyAgainst the trackless round bronze moon,
Strikes concrete and absurdly fires
Into his gut; the others flee.
He cries to no one: “Grandma.”

Why did the gambler
cough so much?


despite much pain
I could not
remember her
whole and lucid
or even weep

and now
with arching pain
come contractions and learning
in the ugly molt of stale dreams
in the blindness and the choking
and the shared color of blood
new world
coming





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