Western Pulps, Gulf Shores

With elegant long tweezers,

she pulls chocolate diamond figures

from beneath her fingernails.

The sun is turning over.

She’s forgotten last night’s lover --

just another boom without a sail.

She plucks a soggy paperback

out of her Givenchy beach bag

and turns it to the dog-eared denouement.

The protagonist is tiring

of some love that is expiring,

but he’s got a job to do, and it’s the law.

A breeze. A squeeze.

A lime coin tossed.

A sip. More lip.

Her legs recross, recross.

Hexagonal sunglasses

hiding winged eyelines and lashes

elongated till they dust against the lens.

The sheriff in her story hangs

his gun belt up and kneels to pray,

“O Lord, don’t make me ride through that again.”

The sun. The fun

she knows she's had. 

Low shadows of

the good, the bad. 

A sniff. A sip.

She heaves her chest.

A wave. Last page.

The trough. The crest.

The crest.

The crest.

Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah.

Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah.