I squat with a rifle
jammed after the only shot all day.
Mesquite twigs silk-screen shade
on caliche. Riding hardscrabble,
a man keeps his rifle loaded.
You don’t get many shots out here.
Sometimes five, six weeks
before someone rides out with orders.
I go where they send me, north with pliers
along the barbed-wire border
or down through arroyos
searching for strays.
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