"give me the
money or I'll put
a fuckin' bullet between
your eyes and Satan don't
mind," in a mean, deep voice,
the outlaw dangled the cloven hoof
of the wild boar in the barkeep's face,

slowed pace,
Sage and Blaze
standing at the top
rise ready to descend,
"what the hell happened
down there?" the voice was
Sage,

A.J. walked in
the saloon, outlaw's
too busy mean, the devil's
way, she crouches under a
table, sweeps the glass aside,
witness to a crime too vile to come
clean,

livery stable,
mid morning, Isaiah
graining and watering
the horses, he's singing a
Negro spiritual, no remorses,

Pony Girl
wakes from
sleeping in the
livery stable, last
night's epiphany a
bad nightmare fable,
rolls up her bedroll, brushes
the loose straw from her clothing
and hair, buckles the pair, her chaps
and gun belt around her waist, tryin' to
get it right,

"Good mornin'
Isaiah, I seem to
have lost my wives
last night,"

Isaiah doesn't
miss a thing, "one
in the church, two in
the saloon," a seer
leftover from a descendant
of slaves, prejudice is two-fold,
he's black and a foreteller of what
the people do not understand, a black
livery hand, miner's value what he's foretold
"hitting the Mother Lode," into Leadville from
the lynch mob he rode,

"outlaw's faceless,
kind I tell my girls to watch
out for, you can always tell those
men, hidin' behind the whiskey disease,
evil pours in disrespect for their mamas that
nursed them from their good breast," Madam
Antonella spoke as witness, the saloon wrecked,
a devil's mess,

Pony Girl
paid her bar
bill, put Morgan
Silver Dollars in
the empty till, went
to send this telegram,
"that outlaw shouted
something about Sage,
If she's one of your Wives,
tell her he said he'd kill every
witch of Leadville,"

"Lord Almighty,
thank heaven for
sending us the broom,"
Blaze rescued The Sundance
Wives Saloon.

Copyright 11/28/2009 Ms. Sage Sweetwater, firebrand lesbian novelist