by Robert VanderMolen

Whatever hotel or town it was
He stood on a balcony with a drink
After a long day driving in the heat

The side of his truck was missing paint
From a fire near Seney — but that was his job,
Lumber management, northern division

Years later, perched in a bar in Oregon
I remember his grey slacks,
Pockets dribbling cash from Hollywood,
One of the tallest women I’d ever met
Returning to him from the restroom

It was around that time
He was also considering a run for a seat
On the Chippewa County board of supervisors,
Just to stay cheerful

I’ve always admired Teddy Roosevelt
He told me in an earnest voice,
Relighting his cigar,
Talking to me like I was a small–town reporter . . .

Then added, matter–of–factly,
You must be divorced again

by Floyce Alexander

Photo of scalp hung by one nail.
Mud–smeared window of the cold house.
Some man’s family crowding together.
This earth always counts its losses.
Men kill. Men die. Men
Always. I know. I am one. I kill you.
I hang your head by the long braid
You spend hours preparing for me.
It’s the gun, honey, throw it out
On the black ice. The West’s mad temptation
To kill what can’t be understood.
Children play the dark forest’s mystery.
Sharp crack, then silence.
I have nothing to report. The sand blows:
I love my mother, I hate my father,
I like to shield his eyes and soothe her nerves.
If you want the news, listen to the floor
Where the valley turns to become mountain.
Bright stars blind the moon.
Undo your braid, let it fall over your shoulders.
I want to love you.
How many times . . .
Nothing flows but the lovers’ run,
A long leap. Waterfall. Kill your children
For me. I have no peace. Let me make war,
Send my enemy starving.
It was only a game, one has to lose.
Photo off to the side, out of the light.
A little history to forget how
Conquest feels. Go home.

by Floyce Alexander

Screams rattle the amphitheater
Of lost dreams. A horror film
In progress nears its end.
I’m restless; aren’t you,
Without your bouffant hairdo?
Swarms of bumblebees
Fill the high grass by the ocean.
I was a mere boy with a scythe
Cutting into their playground
By a river irrigating the valley,
A place to grow and die early
If you surrendered your future,
Married and raised children.

Abandoning my picturesque valley.
I left town. Then many towns.
Cities too. Then hummingbirds
Drank the cup of my long life.
They were the brilliant,
The beautiful I needed.
Did they need me? How did
I know? We were there early.
The crowd was just entering.
I thought I knew a good movie
By its director. The Shining, say,
Was nothing like the novel.
We always preferred the dark.
We stayed too late to sleep.

So we made what’s called love.
Living was all there was to do.

by Floyce Alexander

I could say little happens here.
Snow melts, ice forms.
Tornados seldom follow
Though cold descends, heat rises
Whirring toward funnel shape.
I saw one in Wellington, Kansas,
Far off. Sunflowers kneeled
To touch the earth
I walked, a child.
Next door the widow Yehle
Calmed my mother’s fears.
My father heard nothing
In the Boeing plant in Wichita
Those years the war was on.

Weathermen say a tornado
Blew through last summer.
A branch thick as a tree
Fell between houses, ours
And the neighbor’s,
Whose tree it was.
Huddling with our cats
In the basement.
My love saying Hail Marys,
When I heard the crack
I said, There goes the roof.
I’ve lived here so long
I sound like someone
Who never leaves the house.

Nothing like that happens here,
Friends say who’ve never left.
Trees uprooted down the streets.
They try to set us straight:
That was no tornado,
Just wind, nothing touched down.
Snow is forecast for May Day.
A neighbor said he saw it snow
On the Fourth of July:
You could keep going north.
Forget it, Jack,
We’re not in Kansas anymore.
Nor are we in the city
Wishing to be in the country.