A Story at High Noon

Midday is the time metal warms under salty rays and barrels squeeze lead penes until they explode and burn stomachs with the fire of their finishes. That's how the race is won, hombre. Until tomorrow, when twitching fingers know what the inside of a hole is, I'm watching the past and wondering how it ever got out of that place, under the sun, you and me wearing dirt like clothes, breathing smoke like air. But most of all the smell of herrings rotting in the heat. If you catch me taking a moment to inhale, remember what's in my throat, that smell that brings buzzing interlopers like the hum of electricity shooting through your skull. Dust it off and listen for the rattle before you reach in the eye socket. It's hard to think of home with your brain coiled, señores, unless you've got venom in the blood before the strike. And that's a story about why it's better to be dead than to be harmless.