My friend, who I know only through letters, travels a road I know well.  Her latest announcement draws chuckles from her audience.  A road sign declares: ** Jesus 2024 **  Some reply with equal ironic wonder.  The orange one’s VP pick.  I heard the guy can make miracles happen.  The “running on water thing” is a favorite at campaign events!  He’s over 2,000 years old; ageism will get him.  At least there will be plenty of wine at the White House…. Satire aside, my view locks upon the Ukraine flag lofted, an attention getter on this muted plain.  Its tattered royal blue and sunflower yellow – for that election forecasts much of the same.  Meanwhile, white sage meets chamisa on this dry llano.  I’ve been here before, it welcomes home.  To the right, a reservoir wallows.  Shaded by cottonwoods, a picnic table brings reprieve.  I remember eight years ago, a stop to stretch my legs.  My girl dog discovered payday and smeared herself in a cowpie.  I scrubbed her thoroughly in those cloud reflected waters.  Still, a pervasive mushroom manure funk permeated throughout my bug splotted Subaru.  Onward Southwest, that direction pulls beyond the Hansel and Gretel luring sign, “lake lots available the most beautiful, Colorful Colorado”.  I don’t venture past the ridgeline, doubtful of its claim.  Below Ute Mountain they greet me – Bienvenidos.  The black maned grey muscled stallion and his brown sleek harem. They munch the grama grasses, an open range, one eye cocked to my arrival.  “Vaya con dios”, he’s supposedly coming next year.

Satyr’s miracles
Greet me upon open range
Luring allurements

Shelli Rottschafer completed her doctorate from the University of New Mexico in 2005 in Latin American Contemporary Literature. From 2006 until 2023 Rottschafer taught at a small liberal arts college in Grand Rapids, MI as a Professor of Spanish. Summer 2023 Shelli followed her passion and returned to graduate school to begin her Low Residency MFA in Creative Writing with an emphasis in Poetry at Western Colorado University in Gunnison, Colorado. Shelli resides in Louisville, Colorado and El Prado, Nuevo México.