The End

…The sprawling Cowboy Sunset braced by two

black buttes like a film screen; sun-blazing dust

smoldering red like metal yields to rust;

the cold stars kindling on the fading blue;

the sagebrush, scurrying scraps in the collecting

sea of a prairie night—then, as if cued,

the offstage voice:

                                “The End is also good.”

But was it?  Hackneyed, cornball, unaffecting,

voice, sagebrush, stars, buttes, prairie, sunset sky

were out of a 50’s Western.  My faith rocked

by this creative failure, picture my

horror as I watched Him ride off, Stetson cocked,

black silhouette on cinematic gold,

for the slow Fade Out while the credits rolled…