for Eric
We didn’t make love in the wide bed where whores
used to entertain members of the Sundance Kid’s gang,
high patterned tin ceiling, big oval mirror, window
as wide as the horns of the steers that used to be
driven right past that house on the way to be sold
and slaughtered. We didn’t kiss on the round balcony
the rich saloon owner had built for his daughter
because she read Shakespeare and wanted to dream
she was twelve-year-old Juliet calling the man
she hoped was her rose in spite of his name.
We didn’t sleep in the room where a woman
still comes as a ghost to touch sleepers’ feet
because her drunk husband was shot right below
or her dead papa couldn’t wish her goodnight
or she’s getting impatient in her garters and bows
saying Get on up, girl—it’s my turn in there now.
Fort Worth, Texas
September 2014