I Went Into The Maverick Bar, by Gary Snyder

Hello Poets,
Disguise, escape and connection. Gary Snyder stepping back into the timeless time, embracing our tough old stars and the real work that beckons beyond the bluff.
Best,
Sam

I Went Into The Maverick Bar

I went into the Maverick Bar
In Farmington New Mexico.
And drank double shots of bourbon
                              backed with beer.
My long hair was tucked up under a cap
I’d left the earring in the car.

Two cowboys did horseplay
                                  by the pool tables,
A waitress asked us
                                 where are you from?
a country-and-western band began to play
“We don’t smoke Marijuana in Muskokie”
And with the next song,
                                a couple began to dance.

They held each other like High School dances
                                in the fifties;
I recalled when I worked in the woods
                                  and the bars of Madras, Oregon.
That short-haired joy and roughness-
                                America- your stupidity.
I could almost love you again.

We left—onto the freeway shoulders-
                                under the tough old stars-
In the shadow of bluffs
                                   I came back to myself,
To the real work, to
                                    “What is to be done.”


by Gary Snyder, from Turtle Island, 1974