Joe Cottonwood

Joe Cottonwood has repaired hundreds of houses to support his writing habit in the Santa Cruz Mountains of California. His latest book of poetry is Random Saints. He appreciates bushy eyebrows, big paws, and bent pages.

Juanita of central Kansas

We who are a mom, pop, 3 kids
road-tripping from goofy California
come calling on Aunt Juanita in calm Kansas
this Sunday on her ranch.
Surrounded by rustling rows of corn
at a picnic table we eat barbecued buffalo steak
from Juanita’s small herd,
Juanita’s bloody butchering.
Tastes like spicy beef.

Joining us is one marvelous insect.
Gently it hovers, sets down on the table
like a puff of dandelion, size of a baseball
made of air and thin wire,
gray body with delicate spindly legs
and lichen-like scales of no apparent use
except beauty. Kids and I bend close,
heads bowed like prayer over the tabletop
examining, exclaiming “Oh wow”
wondering what in the world
until Juanita says
“I don’t know what it is but—”
Whap goes her big hand
and crushes the bug with her napkin.
“It’s my farm,” Juanita says,
and that’s that.