Cooking in the Oklahoma Panhandle

Heat ripples off hard-packed dirt in waves,
Easily seen and causing the eyes to water
If one looks too much, too closely-

I look to the side of me, take in the expanse of
Dirt and what they call "buffalo grass" withering
Tan-to-brown from the punishment of intense heat and
Nothing much to drink-

Cactus are common and tumbleweeds too.
In spring they dance, end over end, and climb
Up to cover doorways, entrances and exits, it doesn't
Matter-

The dirt isn't red but brown, not dusty but too hard and
Packed and cracked to move...
I like looking down the cracks, searching for what might
Be underneath-


When I ride in my aunt's car we pass wheat fields...
Long, thin metal stretches all the way across,
Spitting mists of precious, life-giving liquid the
Sky seldom chooses to spit-

Once they made a lake, a really big lake
So we could
Boat and fish and swim,
and once I went to that lake-

I swam away from the others.
I wanted to tred water alone,
experience the glistening abundance
Of water-

There was a small island in the middle, man-made
Like the lake, and I sat on hard-packed dirt.
I turned my face up to the sun, felt it scorch...
I slipped back into the water and shivered-

The lake is gone, long dried up by the
"Natural course of things"
Determined to maintain
Desert where Desert belongs-

The brown dirt where water used to stand is
Hard and cracked, occasionally broken by
Patches of "buffalo grass" that shrink in the
Baking sun.