Down at the music floor
where they sell beer with plastic collars
and gauges hide under mullets
next to cowboy boots with button-downs
and tattoo sleeves stretch to keep the hands warm
and your feet don’t have to move to dance
and the brass band in the corner speaks up for itself
saxophone flirting with pot stink
the twang sways next to the blues
and the drunks only sing in the silence
while the hands wave every way, any way:
amen, amen

Oklahoma is not the South
but it’s all you need round here.

Originally published in This Land: Fall 2015