DRY CRIK Journal

After ten years of fat
grain fed steers,
my fifty dollar Weber
           gas hibachi
has flamed-out
and rusted-through.

It’s fall
and Lowe’s stock
is falling to new
52-week lows
and they got to move
the riding lawnmowers,
patio sets and barbecues
for the cash flow,
to make room out-front
for bigger, better-selling
winter weather wares.

Last week,
my neighbor Tom
rotisseried a Costco
boneless, standing rib roast
I didn’t even have to chew
on his brand-new stainless,
           four-burner,
           forty-eight thousand BTU
           Perfect Flame
that looked like an ice box
and shined like a Grecian Shrine
           Made in China
           he got On Sale
for two long-haired Benjamins.
           I had to have one
and damn-sure had the need.

Leaving early Sunday
to beat the crowd in town,
I caught the crew at Lowe’s
moving sluggishly.
           Bought it On Sale
for one Ulysses more.
Bigger than Tom’s,
a fully-assembled,
           five burner,
           sixty thousand BTU
           Perfect Fame
           on casters
triple-trucker-hitched
and lashed to my dusty flatbed
with one hundred forty feet
of braided soft nylon rope
for thirty nervous
freeway minutes
out of town.

Slow and easy
on Dry Creek Road,
seven barren heifers
with ninety-days on grain
looked up – recognized
the sound of my truck –
           but not, I trust
the shiny prophecy
I hauled home.

                     for Tom Magan