Holaday Mason

Spring Thaw

On my eighteenth birthday
you asked what I wanted &
I said a chocolate bar and
to leave the reservation.

We walked the seven miles
to highway 41 across
the endless April thaw. 
And returned to civilization,
you searched for quarters
in the front pockets of worn
Levi’s to buy two Hershey
bars from the gas station
machine, both of them for me.

Hollow with farewell, your eyes
cast about the Badlands, so,
on an open palm, I sacrificed
one bar just to watch the corners
of your mouth turn up then down
as stale grayed chocolate
melted into bitter sweetness.

That winter on Pine Ridge
outside our two-room cabin
Corrina birthed six pups.
We found the little steaming pile
next to her, next to the woodpile
on the south flank, the air thick
with blizzard and blood.

Giving the whelps no names,
we built a fort of wet wood
to guard against the snowfall,
then circled the squirming mess
with medicine tobacco ties,
the few that remained after
we’d scavenged them to smoke
the Bull Durham, rolling bitter
flakes in Tampax wrappers since
there were no Zig Zag papers left.

That Spring struggled against
its’ own confinement ¾
sameness built a horizon over
our single dingy windowpane.
It numbed the sky. You got thin,
poked at the woodstove, dreamed
of summer Sun Dance while I read
and reread old romance novels
set in the south of France.

In the flat hours of a wandering
afternoon, you found a dead cow.
She had used teats, her big leg was
tangled in the barbed wire fence
that cut across an otherwise endless
field of white. Starved to death.

Shattered femur. Broken hide.
Torn flesh. Cold. Muscle cold
and blood frozen. We cut off
both legs, dragged the haunches
home for supper, for the months
ahead, for the pups. A track led
to our doorway in the middle
of nowhere a mile beyond
the curves of that legless cow.

White cold is as big and strange
as deep sleep. And fine hills lose
themselves, until snow shaves
off the edges of a universe gone
blind once you’ve fallen into a drift.
I begged you to stay close¾
please not to wander, not to let
your footprints disappears into
the white glove of the void.

Unable to sleep, you were afraid
of the rancher whose wide pock-
marked face filled our five-foot
doorway the next morning. He
wore an enormous black hat¾
a big Oglala Sioux John Wayne.
The smell of juicy fruit gum
wafted around his mouth
both eyes invisible behind
oily polaroid rainbow shades.

You made him a deal
for the meat, then followed
him in your sagging blue jeans
into the flawless white.

For three days you chopped
wood, changed worn rubber tires
with less-worn rubber tires,
hammered the clapboard sides
of his shack, the walls covered
in old calendars, with pin up girls,
a little too plump, “like you,”
you said, and old Christmas paper
with personal greetings scrawled
in looping ballpoint blue.

I banked the fire, watched
through that grimy window
as blue became black, rolled
sacred tobacco & smoked until
my fingers burned. And, when
there was a slim cool diamond
moon you returned and you
kissed me hard for the first time
in that long pale winter.

Low Tide

We don’t know what it is, this strange burnt sienna
settled along the curves of grandmother’s beach at the marina. 
Dogs leap & run as always. They chase orange balls, skid
obliviously through the marvels of washed-up designs beautiful
enough for a museum show—a winding flow of rust colored
detritus specked with neon candy wrappers, water bottles, beer cans. 
A child spins cartwheels, legs scissored in the air. She can stand
on her hands, face flush with blood as she hangs upside down
like the Hanged Man. We don’t know what these rivers of red are¾
these unexpected swirling drawings sloughed up by the sea’s
constant rhythm. There are no swimmers. No lifeguard to ask.
One old surfer walks thigh deep hauling his heavy antique board,
watches the froth of dirty waves, turns defeated, trudges inland
over the long white length of sand. A bulldog runs free, mouth
stuffed with a small chunk of scorched wood he has found. 
He drops it to snuffle the sea lace of clay hued foam. The sand is red.
The water is red. The squiggles of patterns slither north & south
as if a mythical snake has arrived to slowly feast.  Then we understand. 
We’re walking on houses. On trees, on phone poles & signage—
we are walking on the Reel Inn, on the old oak trees, on hearths
& mattresses, couches, pillows, bedding, heirlooms & sweaters,
dresses, books & books of family photos.  We are walking on
the remains of the burned city washing up on shore. We are
walking on lives. The red currents of the story go on
as far as we can see.  You start to weep. We both do.