Transport in a Farm Town
Most of the cars are as ancient
as some of the drivers
But they run as smooth as oiled hinges
Here the men can repair anything
made before computers
And here where the only fast traffic
fractions the town in half on Highway 87
Mustangs are one-horse powered
with their leather on the outside
No stoplights have ever reddened the skyline
The last bus that delivered people
died from Greyhound greed
And trains are memories in elderly minds
of President Truman waving from a caboose
Like Sadie Farrel's, whose kids finally took
her driver's license away
After she drove into a ditch
thinking it was the gas station
So they gave her a golf cart with a red flag
A waving warning to others that she
can't see without binoculars
Everyone hopes she won't meet Howi
whose wife always drove him until she died
Who's legally blind but rides
his garden tractor around town anyway
And heaven forbid Sadie should meet
a twelve-year old whose license
was issued by honest farm labor
Qualifying him to sneak a jalopy into town
on a Saturday night
There are enough pickup trucks and four-wheelers
to justify the Redneck Club on main street
And by god nobody better mess
with eighty-year old Erna
Who rides her Harley in from Havre
every so often
—Ellaraine Lockie, Sunnyvale, CA
