His walk is the walk of a man
facing into the wind, blue
norther with a hint of snow
his voyageur heart
set on finding
the edge of the edge
or the pine tree
at the cartographic centre
of the USA –
Lebanon, Kansas.
His walk is the walk
of rustlers, hustlers
wranglers, cutters
vaquero reinsmen
old time believers in
bosal, mecate
whispering.
His walk walked out
of a border ballad
bandit corridos
Arapaho yodels.
His walk is a backlit
black & white saunter
down Main Street
past the pool hall
the pickup truck
the picture show.
His walk has heels on
Mexican, Texan, Cuban
they echoed oddly
that time at Coney Island
nails in the boardwalk
a tunnel by the sea.
His walk walked miles
while he talked to himself
told stories about
mission stiffs, grainers
the liberty bell.
His walk gave him snake hips
a defiant turn against
his own centres of gravity.
All weathers his walk
took him west
it had Wenatchee
it had Wyoming
it had something about horses
written all over it.
Canadian poet Kathleen McCracken is the author of eight collections of poetry including Blue Light, Bay and College, shortlisted for the Governor General's Award for Poetry, and a bilingual English/Portuguese edition entitled Double Self Portrait with Mirror: New and Selected Poems. She was a finalist for the WB Yeats Society of New York Poetry Competition, the Montreal International Prize for Poetry, The Walrus Poetry Prize, and the CBC Poetry Prize. In 2019 she won the Seamus Heaney Award for New Writing. Kathleen is currently Lecturer in Creative Writing and Contemporary Literature at Ulster University, Northern Ireland.
