Someone built a false front
on the bar maybe
to keep wives
girlfriends
driving slowly
from seeing menfolk
holding up the bar
or an occasional blond.

Possibly to slow
an accidental bullet
or men who date blonds.

Whatever the reason
smoky light crawls
around it to whisper
across the gravel
carry secrets
out to its friend
the night.

Michelle Hartman’s latest book, The Lost Journal of My Second Trip to Purgatory, has just been released from Old Seventy Creek Press. The first poetic look at child abuse and its effects on adult life. The first book of its kind from a recognized publisher. Along with her poetry books, Irony and Irreverence and Disenchanted and Disgruntled, from Lamar University Press, Lost Journal is available on Amazon. She is the editor of Red River Review.