Steve Meador
It took twenty-one years
of turning stones, rolling logs,
poking sticks into holes,
before I saw a rattlesnake in the wild.
All the while remembering
the summer I was thirteen
and the signs shimmying in the desert
heat of northern New Mexico.
Signs teased us every couple miles
as we sipped warm cherry Kool-Aid,
staining our lips twice their size,
and discussed the six-foot diamond back,
the coiled man-killer
at the Indian Trading Post,
“Only 20 miles ahead!”
At “10 miles ahead!” we all had to pee,
at “JUST 2 MORE MILES!!!” our bladders
nearly burst, but we made it
and danced around the cinderblock pit
holding six starving rattlers. An old cowboy
with a straw hat smacked the snakes
with a stick, producing nothing
more than the sound of wood
whacking dwindling flesh.
“Must be too cold to rattle,” he told us.
Needed to be closer to 110, I figured.
The six-footer advertised over the miles
had died years before. Its skeleton
was in the Trading Post under glass,
in fairness, more dreadful without skin,
the row of ribs looking like a deadly fangs.
On the way back to the car I glanced
into the pit again, knowing all six
would soon be inside
happily adorning a dusty shelf,
as a hatband or wallet.
