Persona: A What-If Version of the I

The narrator here is someone I might have been, but he is not me. I started with the line by George Strait and then imagined myself into this guy.

Itch

Amarillo by morning, up from San Antone. I
begin two-stepping in my kitchen alone, George Strait

crooning another lonesome cowboy ballad,
dancehall memories unfurling, smoke-hazed.

Every sliding solo step, every swirling pivot, every
fancy maneuver, takes me back to an August night.

Gruene Hall. Luchese boots, spit-shined. Dusky
hat brim rakishly tipped. Jeans so snug they made me

itch. I miss who I might have been. I miss
Jax beer iced so cold it made my teeth hurt,

khakis starched stiff as a wet-dream boner.
Lucifer moves in me tonight, knows how to tempt me—

makes me want a margarita—Cuervo Gold—murmurs
Numb yourself. Go ahead. Never stop at one. If

only the lie could make it so, the fall from
paradise reversible. One dancing tune, one drink alone cannot

quench the hunger roiling in me when the cowboy
rides away. Heard that song graveside once—

straight up made me cry. Wonder will I shed tequila tears
tonight, dance around the room alone some more. Mr.

Unrequited, feeling sorry for himself, certified
ventriloquist’s dummy, full of jukebox heartache.

What am I to do, wanting whiskered kisses, triple
X tussles with a hairy-bellied bronco buster?

Yearning, I sip another margarita. I dream a man named
Zebediah. Bestowed by God. Would that he will come.

Published in Caliche Road Poems (Lamar University Literary Press, 2024)