Sixteen Inches in Bismarck, North Dakota

by Catfish McDaris

More damn snow than a sane man can endure,
I’d never quite passed the sanity test, I’d been
living and dreaming in the badlands, riding the
rails, catching odd jobs now and then, trying to

Forget my sadness and agony, my soul felt gored
like a bull, drenched in blood, waiting for relief,
I missed the New Mexican dancing Memameior,
and the loco Huachiqueleros, Mexican gas thieves

Gas was like gold in Mexico, it wasn’t siphoned,
the thieves used plastic saddle bags over their
shoulders and cut holes into gas pipes, it flooded
all over them while filling the bags, ten or more

People waiting for their turn, the least spark would
have blown them sky high, the last bag man had pipe
tape, it slowed the gushing pipe down, I sort of liked
the danger, but I went to Aguascalientes, April was

Three weeks of bullfighting, there were hot springs,
vineyards, the infamous National Museum of Death,
my amigo, Saturnino had invited me for a month, so
I took him up on his offer, his life was a bit rich for me.