The Huntress Neglects Her Children

Catching the thoughts of her overgrown front lawn
Loretta tumbles into hammock and Bailey’s
her eyes on.

On Diana who shoots with two arms
lets them rest at her sides
fingertips tickling clover
and mother-of-thyme.

She remembers two girls playing
in a kitchen
a pilot with cirrhosis
hunched over
an oven being lit.
A sticky day at Fremont,
the parade of campers
didn’t stop.

Stop at Mary’s little church
where Loretta once worshipped
before her father
arching low
knees bent
open to TV reception.

Receptive to smoke
the Last Pioneer Woman of the West
pulls on her cigarette

drawls

“I didn’t know you were trying
to save those wolves.
We’ll cut the horns
off those elk
and sell them tomorrow.”