I first found Sundance bleeding in the desert like a dog.

Dirt stuck to him in broken window panes,
he bent his neck toward me in parts.

Spoke through eyes red like Arizona rock.

******* was so *****,
looked like the desert spat him up.

Turns out it was the next town over.



They’d never done a proper hanging, before.


What happens when you’ve never done a
proper hanging before is loose hands.

Loose hands have a tendency
toward knives.

Sheriff sort of looked like a cross,
on his back,
that big knife stickin’ straight up like
a piece of glass.

Almost looked like Christ,
all curled up,
shining bright,
golden in all that dust.

Sundance drowned the devil in the Rio Grande.

Sundance had hands that were ****** quick.

I once saw him on a slow day.
Even then, they didn’t get to see the lightning,
people on the wrong end.

All they got was that black-hole barrel.
Must have looked like a third eye, on the other side. 

Must have looked like a sunset.  
Sundance’s tequila-blues,
a little shimmer, orange, red.  


Six sunsets in three seconds
he was that quick.


In Bolivia we met two hundred Federalies 
and I first saw him shake. 



He said everything’s upside-down on the other
side of the equator and sunsets happen
the wrong ****** direction here.

Said we got lazy and let the Texas
spin us over the wrong way.

I bet he was quick enough to see the lightning
before the black.

Sundance told me when the world ends,
it’ll start in Texas.

Said there’s a few canyons there that’ll swallow
the whole ****** planet if we’re not too careful.

Said we’ll be wakin’ up next to ****** snakes,
before anyone notices.

Hutch hopped about
Foraging as usual
Sundance stealthily
Crept towards her
Hutch sensed danger
Turned this way and that
Wrinkling her nose
To test the breeze
But did not detect
Her murderers crouch
Sundance sneaked
Towards a **** position
Getting ready to pounce
Hutch twitched her nose
Oh no , she thought
I'm being stalked
Sundance leapt into space
That's all he had
Hutch had gone.

how i have ached to walk amongst the evergreens
encased by dazzling quaking aspen
in my rocky mountain home

i yearn to fall again while skiing
and catch a wisp of icy sky blue
snow powder crystals
on my tongue
******* feelings
rise and fall
as they melt
and disappear

i long to breathe in your scent
sitting on the peak of wooded ridges
amidst slate colored boulders
sea salt combined with cinnamon
laced with wildflowers
crisply filling my lungs

i hunger to once again
behold again your red rock formations
creating tender hollows
through which timid coral sunsets peer

i crave hiking at dusk
into your jagged emerald forests
and sit wistfully mid the columbine
while darkened sunflowers juxtapose
against the jet black emptiness
enticing the stars
to etch enchanting paintings
on inky cobalt skies

hankering to be at the sundance film festival
coyly peeking into restaurants
covertly spying on the movie stars
on old park city main

itching to experience waiting patiently
for a moose to cross the street
its majesty splashing gingerly
sending chills throughout the galaxy
magnificence abounds

i pine to have memories gently cradle me
like worn out patchwork quilts
warmed by incandescent fires
wrapping me in soft colored canvas
the past craving transformation
by an echo that’s now dim

faintly crying out for
an old familiar artist’s brush
that still lingers
to snag times gone by
and paint the future in

amalgamating the antiquated
with the present
luring in
my destiny

i dream to don my fringed leather jacket
and hear my cowboy boots
fiercely clicking
against charcoal shadowed midnight sidewalks
while i watch the harvest moon

i’m parched too see your autumn chestnut leaves
against the bloodshot auburn sky
as cardinal hues give way to glistening winter
melding into tender spring

your summertime birthing
tingles down my spine
as chartreus aspen leaves
morph to golden bisque
enticing ute country
to blow in
copper colored indian summers
with cherry fragrant wind

yutaahih you were called
by the apaches
their historic essence
somehow ingrained within
my every cell
thirsty to lie enveloped
like a long lost lover
in your rugged western terrain

once having left your presence
i return to you now
my heart flutters
with wild anticipation
to see your precious face again
utah

©2016janetaylor

you make my legs

                             fill with lust

                                                         and some sundance

                                     chemical I cannot

                                                               ­           explain. you make

                                                   me feel like your

        pupils are the sun

                               and the sun has

                                                               ­                       little in respect

                                          to you aside from

                    attribution to the

                                                               ­  very existence of

                                                               ­                                         the girl I love.

                                                          you make me feel

                                like free chai tea

                                                   lattes, even if this

                                                               ­        analogy was used by

                                                               ­                           an ex of mine to

                                                               ­                                           describe how she

                                                               ­                                                           felt about me I

                                                               ­                                                                 ­        feel it's still

                                                               ­                                                                 ­                     valid in context.

                                   you make me dance

                        like thunder in a

                                          snowstorm and link

                          arms with my lack

                                                      of a bedside table

                and ring as true as

                                           my ears to the ashen

                                                               ­        corner-lounge love-drug-all-this-please.

                                      

                       ­             I love you,
                                    I love you,
                                    
                           ­         I love you,


                                    I love you.



                                                         ­          holy sweet good *******,


                                                   you sweet,

                                                   sweet soul,
                                                    

          ­                                         not even

                                                          novel­s
                                                  
                                                                ­  could properly explain

                                                       how my universe swells into serotonin heartbeats
                                                      ­                    whenever
                                    ­                                       you're
                                                          ­                wherever
                                        ­                                    with

                                                               ­              me.

i'm not worried
about tying any
fraying or
loose ends

just take me back to
where i started
meet me up
in sundance

i want to make
a movie out of your
skin, the way you
move like ivy vines,

a movie-ode
to your ode-begging
face.

if i could,
i'd enter us
into a film festival
we could be a sundance
winner, a student
film phenomenon.

i bet you it would
go something
like this,
enter a blank screen,
fade into a shot of you skin,
pan out to show your face, or
body.

all skin.
all skin.

you are beautiful for
a split second,
until my voice cracks the
silence
i tell you that we could be
no one, and nothing.
and you ask me.

for what?
so we make the movie anyways.

Bury me with the River Spirit.
Frozen underground,
surrounded by snow
in the heart of the canyon.
Let it hold me next to the babbles,
the falls, in the trees and among the cabins
I can't hear or see.
On my knees howling at the sun,
it shines down and
stings my frostbite.
Dead in the ground
when the canyons fail,
the waters halt and
all things fall and
I won't see you.
All things are harder to find
when you are in a wooden box
and buried.

Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                    Butch and Sundance: The Latest Remake

                      Union Pacific: Train Robberies Up 356%...
                                           -News Item

Narrator, old cowboy geezer sitting on the porch and smoking his pipe:

Well, now, Butch and Sundance (I’ll tell you no lies)
Stop the U.P. right in its trackages
And glaring at the passengers one of ‘em cries:
“All y’all hand over yer Amazon packages!”

Walking into the Reception Hall,
they stole the show away,
A regal pair they were,
with a little bit of Butch
and Sundance swagger shown.
A confident air, not at all underserved.
Dressed with just enough elegance.

Their posture and hue ,
sleek and silky golden,
like a duet of Cheetahs.
Eyes alert and searching
for prey. Alert for danger.

Like a herd of antelope,
all heads turned to look,
The men perhaps out of desire,
the women staring envy at them,
Like the twin bores of a loaded gun.

Mother and fetching daughter,
From twenty feet, hard to tell
which, one was one, or the other.
Long blond hair, full and fine,
both women tall, statuesque,
moving with grace and ease.

The mother my old friend,
the daughter all grown up now,
each having a smile that would
light up anyone's darkness of mood.

We greeted one another,
hugs and hand shakes shared.
A little conversation in the crowded room,
Many pairs of eyes upon us there.

Enchanted is the word that best describes
my impression, this duo as intelligent and
charming as they were beautiful to see.
The mother sedate, classy and yet open
and free, no pretense, no games just naturally
at ease. As lovely as I remembered her to be.

Her offspring, vivacious, spirited and bold,
smart as whip, with a tongue that could
draw blood if she desired it to.
Chatty and funny, sure of herself,
in the manner of beautiful people,
yet not in a pompous way, merely
Confident in self and her place in the world.
She possessed all the character traits you
would wish your own daughter to have.
Her Mother had done well is raising her.

Too soon they moved on,
meeting and greeting others',
out of my hearing and seeing.
Some weeks have passed, a month or two
and yet their strong impression has lingered,
I can't keep them out of my mind.

The Mother, my friend most of all.

Take me to the swan-graced waters...
Where dragonflies would visit,
and skim the surface on tireless wings.

I’d sit with the grounds’ keepers
- the cicadas.
Invisible guardians,
whose shrill song and calls
would only echo through the sparse foliage
and trees - entrancing me into a state of
accompanied aloneness.

A calming solitude,
that enables the eyes
to lapse into a deep,
unjudging gaze into the lake.

And as time slows to a halt,
each breath would lengthen...
The sun would dip into the distant edge
of the lake.
And my heart would skip
as it interprets the dance of the sun
on the water.