-drive by day-

Rattlesnake hunting

In the desert of New Mexico

On the line out of Jemez Pueblo

Traveling fast in a pickup

On a two lane blacktop

Cracked by Sun,

With Chez Valquez

And two of his kids who were out

For the frozen blood of rattlesnakes.

The snipped and dried rattles of their tails

Made snazzy trinkets on decorated sticks
Which clicked like the living snake.

There was a market someplace.

Some sort of need.

Lots of snakes were killed under the

Wheels of the pickups, and the beaten

Station wagons of the Pueblo,—

Rusty hulks of machines, nearly romanic

If you lived someplace else.

There’s a lot of snakes out there

And they cross the road to get to the other side.

But in the desert, that’s the same dry side
As the side they came from.

Strange and funny watching a seven

Year old girl in a dusty sundress

And little hand-me-down sandals

Chase-down a squirming rattler

Rolled from under the wheels
Of her father's working pickup.

She ran to the snake, throwing her skinny
Arms out from her sides when she stopped

Bending forward, looking curiously
From a ten foot distance.

She was told never to touch

And when’s the last time

Your mother or your father warned you
Not to touch

The rattlesnake squirming
In the middle of the road in the desert?

                                 New Mexico / 1969