trudging across one-way trails

burnt into these red copper hills, then

descending into another dried up wash,

Jacob came upon a distant destiny,

an abandoned ghost town

done up just right

in spite of its now departed proselytizing Sabbath gorgers

the marked cards had been dealt, open faced,

last epitaph for lost Tombstone gold miners

wasted along thirsty scanty silver-dust trails long ago

could this forsaken place provide refuge for such a wandering desperado,

who once returned to blast open the remaining jail cells after making his getaway,

who held up whorehouse tea parties filled with priests and diplomats,

who denounced the town's God-fearing glory-be horse traders on The Tombstone Epitaph's front page,

and who posed as a rainmaker, somehow causing flood waters to overrun Tombstone's streets and alleyways

“the schedules have already been writ”, declared Jacob,

"these dark dog-hollering nights have now been forever tucked away,

hidden beneath the long lost golden gorges

that head straight into these mule hoofprinted hills"

“so better to take the winter off,

commence measuring distances”

and off rode Jacob clear into southwestern history...

these current monsoonless summers,

Tombstone townsfolk gossip about those long-ago good hard rains

that shattered the already flooded streets,

reminisce about those elastic dog breakers shedding their last wet coats

and miners shitting in outhouses reading newspapers being swept away by the unforgiving currents,

townsfolk crowding under rotting moldy wooden doorways

babbling tales of lost and found runaways,

their blazing hot bootheels shuffling over hot loose concrete and sandstone pebbles,

their makeshift red parched coveralls

hidden in closets once dripping,

streets now wounded with sweltering tar and animal bones,

decimated hills now begging any encircling coyote for just a solitary lick,

and the once hopeful Tombstone Chamber of Commerce now an unlatched rusted key

forsaken somewhere to unlock a long gone stranger’s hotel room

while 23 miles to the east, Bisbee's newcomers proffer:

are these border walls built to separate or to put us in touch with karmic justice?

Bisbee, 9/11/73