Vegas
Sand Twisters
Kevin Heslop is a poet and actor
from London, Ontario, where he organizes lomp: reading series and is resident
interviewer for The /temz/ Review and
Poetry London. His second chapbook was published by Frog Hollow Press this
fall.
“You know what it is? I
come to Vegas year after year—I love the people, I love the weather, I love the
environment, I love the food. You know, I don't gamble, but what it is for me
is that people come here towards the end of their lives—and not necessarily
just the elderly, but––generally they’re in the last third of their lives. They’re
in their golden years; there’s a little mist on the mountaintop, you know? And
they come here to try to make things better for themselves. That’s all. They
come here with a couple of nickels in their pocket to make it. You see, she's
on the elevator about to get off. She’s got her favourite windbreaker on, the
one with the blocks of colour on it, and she's got her lucky white tennis shoes
tied just so, and the bracelet she's wearing her late husband gave her the
anniversary before he died she turned three times on her wrist for good luck
like always, and the full pack of marlboro lights are with the lighter in the
front left pocket of her windbreaker. And the elevator hits her floor and bingo:
she looks up, and in that instant, she's somebody. And that's why I love this
place. ‘Cause that's every person you see here. And it's the American Dream;
it's alive and well in Vegas. You come here to make it and you'll be damned if
you didn't roll your dice. You see this old guy here? He's got his Mets cap on
and it's turned just so slightly just an itty bit to the right and he's got the
good mints in his pocket and he's wearing his yellow socks and he's gonna make
his slot machine sing today. It's gonna be his day. And that's it: these people,
they come here as their best selves and they're as optimistic a group as you
can find anywhere on god's green earth. It never rains in Vegas, you know. It
never rains here. No one expects it to. It's really––what it is––is a climate
thing. A question of climate. It’s a mood, a feeling that's here every day
right down to the direction that guy right there buttoned his shirt. And it's
everywhere. Today’s gonna be my day. And that's all it is. Today is gonna be my
day. It's Manifest Destiny. It’s religion. It's whatever you want, but it's
people who have come to their holy land to pray to something greater than
themselves for a better life––to be let in on the secret, just to glimpse. And
whether you believe it, or not, in god––I personally do. I'm a Christian. That’s
why I wear this. But even if you're an atheist, or whatever you are––and we're
all sinners, and if this is our Jerusalem, there's always going to be conflict––you’ve
come to touch whatever it is on the shoulder and ask for this day for it to be
you. I remember when I was a kid, probably about nine––eight, nine somewhere in
there. And my little brother asked—We were living in Texas; that’s where I'm
from. And he asked—We were in the car and my daddy was drivin’ and it was
rainin’ outside but there was a break in
the clouds clear as day and a shaft of the most beautiful light you ever saw
shooting right down to a spot down the mountain. And he asked What's that? And
I remember my daddy said that that was somebody's miracle. Isn’t that something?
It was somebody getting a miracle that day. And I believed it sure as stink,
and so did my brother and so did my daddy. And when I come to Vegas it's filled
with that beautiful light. It’s just brimming with it. You walk down the
sidewalk and that light hits you and you say, Ah. And it's your miracle today.
It's all of our miracle. Yeah, I remember that––him saying it was somebody's
miracle. I bring that with me just about every place I get to. This here's holy
land. This, all this––all this––this is your miracle today. Now you go on and
get it. … OK? Did you get what you needed, or––?”
Sand Twisters
“Well, we ain’t had but
foul luck six years runnin’, and what with the water ration we can’t keep much
of nothin’ green, neither pasture nor billfold. The dust set down in the night
with the weight of the dew so as soon as dawn starts its bleed in the east and
the air thickens with the vapour risen from the earth and the first of the herd
are loosed from the barn to go wander wide and weary for a mouthful of grass,
and we make to the field and try to talk some sense to the sky for a rain, we
ain’t makin’ no more sense than the cattle lookin’ for somethin’ ain’t
brown in the desert. We’re deeper in debt than a beetle in shit and there ain’t
no end in sight to that. Government been puttin’ subsidies together about a
decade now but it ain’t half as much as we need fallin’ below the bracket as we
do: see, you get such and such amount per hundred acres and we’re sittin’ at
just under three hundred what with the sale to Monsanto four summers back––which
I didn’t want to do anyway, but we hadn’t but one choice as that’s concerned.
There just ain’t no money in farming these days ‘less you’re lookin’ out over a
quarter million acres or more, and there ain’t but nine or ten folks with a
spread like that. And they’re not lookin’ for partners. You asked about the
weather, but there ain’t been much of that that I can recall. Ain’t seen a rain
in four flat months now, but the wind whips up some now and again. Sand twisters,
we call ‘em. Some days we’ll quit early and make for a glass of lemonade on the
porch and look out to count ‘em as they spin with the sun settin’ all behind.
It’s sure pretty, but it don’t do much for my spirits. The kids get to naming ‘em
sometimes, the sand twisters, but they ran clean through all the names known between
the six of ‘em and had to look through the good book for help––shoutin’ names
like Rosh and Jaconian and Haggith. You know, I touched the Bible every night
as a boy and most nights still but I ain’t heard half the names they come
throwin’ at the wind. Lot of folks think we’re lookin’ at the Endtimes, and
maybe this country wasn’t never so great as some folks seem to think. But I don’t
quite know what to make of that. Maybe it’s just I don’t have the nerve to what
with my daughter settin’ astraddle my knee like a weency cowgirl as a real tall
twister starts up quite a long ways from the house and she sticks her pudgey
little hand out and points, shoutin’ Look Daddy! Look, Daddy. Look at that one;
that’s a good one. Most days I just don’t have the stomach to get to thinkin’ what-all
that means and what I’ve done, as a father. I’ll just dip my head down all
quiet and press my lips to that miracle of a head of hers and whisper that I
see it. I see it, baby. I do. And I’ll reach out to the glass sweatin’ with the
lemonade and flick those droplets of cool water on the back of her neck and
watch it dry there just as quick as it appeared. And she’ll giggle and spin
around, and I’d give every ounce of blood in my body and every yard of land I
still own for that sound as the wind comes claiming little handfuls of dust for
the heavens in fits like twisted premonitions of rapture and I think of her. I
think of her. I think of her against the last of the light and the dust startin’
to settle some with the weight of the first of the dew. I think of her fightin’
those eyelids heavy as lead like a tiny drunken boxer what can’t stand within
the count to ten come crumplin’ up into my chest and hands around my neck whose
fingers are makin’ little flicking motions in jest and memory. And carryin’ her
up the stairs warm and her heart beatin’ its count and I’m sure of nothin’ of
what’s comin’ except the next step and the next step and just a-settin’ her
down to dream like a parcel in the rain. Some nights I have words with the
Maker, and some nights they aren’t but for Him to hear. But mostly I just sit
starin’ into the dark and I think of her. I think of her.”
