introducing .....Paul Zarzyski

    THE CAR THAT BROUGHT YOU HERE STILL RUNS   

—Richard Hugo, from Degrees of Gray in Philipsburg

It takes more than gasoline and gumption

to get you to Zortman—more

than whimsy or a wild inkling

to rekindle history. It takes a primal prairie

need, a kinship with Old Man Winter, with Napi

hunkering in sunless gulches, a longing

for short Fourth of July parades, the bestkept-

secret-café with a waitress

who commutes 50 miles from Malta—

big city with its 5 p.m. rush

minute, she quips. Pavement—purt-near

all the way to the corrugated last

half mile into work—

through herd after mule deer herd,

excites her. What can anyone say in words

that Charles M. Russell has not

narrated in paint. Little Rockies, Larb Hills,

predator versus prey versus wind

still give this Indian-cowboy

landscape its animation.

Your eggs

jiggling over-easy, hashbrowns crisp,

roughcut slabs of real ham,

one pancake seat-cushioned over its own plate

(whole wheat toast sold out last month

to hot-shot fire crews), are all grilled

just right. The coffee, vintage-grind,

is brewed with water so mineralthick,

it’s panned first,

then filtered. Same goes for the décor—

local art collaged with faded Russell prints

above faux-brick wainscoting.

Lucky—

the 11 a.m. lull all to yourselves—

you are, for once, simply where you need

to be. Do not ponder why. Do not

ask the waitress what brought her here

from Seattle. The wall clock is not

locked in neutral. Thus, you better be

willing to revel in this living limbo,

this muffling of drumroll death. Muse

over your food. Ruminate,

while chewing, on each tooth’s name—

incisor, canine, bicuspid, molar—

salute the taste buds, bitter to sweet,

as you clean your plate, pony up,

inch your way out of town

with a groan—heartstrings taut

as lariats stretched to whatever rogue

lodestar pulled you into this

still-shot of Montana past, grass

ropes strained to their organic max,

aching to hold for only so long.

.....

begin and end with wind

    LOGAN PASS VISITOR CENTER            

Wind

           clear

as a double pane

                     window

sleet and snow

drive parallel

to the pavement

"is it like this

every day?"

tourists ask

"except for a few

days in July"

a ground squirrel

           begging

           concrete

                  steps

knows when to pose

probably even proper

                    shutter

                   speed

it's slick and wet

                now

a spot of blue sky

if you're quick

          you might measure

raw snow ridges

Clements

Oberlin fading

in a blast

of sleet and wind

         David Thomas

23 July 1981  West Glacier

....

one way to go

                      DOWN AND OUT             

at the crossroads again

begging the bosses for work,

some way to make it, easily,

a monthly grub-steak, a few

bucks in exchange for me,

my aging-marketable abilities,

whatever they may be, since

I need money, shelter, time,

that tick-clocking and increasing

chill-risk factor, whatever

jobs-to-be-got, whatever shit

needs shoveling, cold palms

to be squeezed—I’m your man,

I know I can get it done, keep

my songs buried, be a good

employee till this hollow shell,

my chest cavity, retires to pretend

the black hole is really this blue

heart aching, circling the dying

fire (and our silly, repetitive games)

oh-so briefly before the light fades.

                               Mark Gibbons  ( Missoula Bard )

....