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 )

....

ether/or

   Coming Out of the Ether (1)                        

Every six months shove steel into me.
Use all the locals you want (please)
It’ll still unify me
By pinning my many in
Authentic selves to the single thing
They’re only shadows of.
Goodbye Piccadilly,
Farewell hysteria,
Everyone was singing the same song,
And it wasn’t in my dreams
Where I’ve been seeing you.
It’s like being told
I’m harboring a fatal disease,
But more so, much

And yet not at all, much
Better. It’s like real
Sex but not much like that either.
Just that it makes me sane.
Why bother adding that
Is only a feeling?
It’s like being Creeley
Or really any of those people
Turning eighteen during WW II,
Part of a giant Chance
Sink or swim so they swam.
Put their queer shoulder
To the general wheel.

The name of the foundering
Vessel’s ‘Leviathan.’
Captains of industry
In the lifeboats first,
And money is that industry,
Leaving us breathless.
You, me, & our friend M.
As for our particulars;
Send your blank checks
C/o Søren Kierkegaard,
101 The Deli; Walnut Creek.
We’ll be the view from his deck.
Scalpel.



                     David Bromige














....

reptilian verse

 Five Lizards                     

1. Benidorm 1966

It could let go its tail if caught.

Fat siesta sun full

on my back, I kept still, held

myself invisible, in love

with its dry archaeological scuttle

quicker than thought.

2. Silves 2001

Those two, geckos with the magic toes ––

guardians of our rented house

in Portugal. While we watched

the terrible loops of data on CNN ––

the towers turned

into blooming smoky candles again and again ––

they returned each night and set

under the porch light

short delicate shadows.

3. Malaga 2004

When you threw another log on the fire

something half-fell, half-

scrambled, smoking on the hearth.

Must have been asleep in the woodpile. For

a handful of heartbeats it froze

as if considering –– flagstones, open door

to the Andalusian stars ––

before skittering back to its bolt-hole, the core

raftered with blue-orange flame ––

safe as ashes, as clay,

already part of the same

sky we’d be vapouring into the following day.

4. Inis Mór 2005

Saw a sand lizard’s face poke

out of a slice

of blackness in a gryke

and was vouchsafed

something of the island’s discrete

micro-climates –– time zones

seeded between the old

carboniferous floors

shifting their plates:

elaborate flying buttress

of bramble and tiny, rare

nova-flowers that burn

in there with feathery tails

of scaly-male fern.

           Mark Granier

...

the worlds' greatest poet returns

Two egotists conversed one day,
Each in a quite contented way,
And each—the vain and happy elf—
Soliloquized about himself.


Speech is a bridge, from mind to mind,
For gainful interchange designed;
But when you meet a selfish man,
The bridge has lost its central span!








......anonymous


















....

Ashes of Roses

Soft on the sunset sky
Bright daylight closes,
Leaving, when light doth die,
Pale hues that mingling lie,-
Ashes of roses.

When love's warm sun is set,
Love's brightness closes;
Eyes with hot tears are wet,
In hearts there linger yet
Ashes of roses.






                          Elaine Goodale Eastman






















.......