Different Roads

By Larry Meredith

"Different roads sometimes lead to the same castle."
—George R.R. Martin

The works in this anthology reflect both the myth and the truth about the part of the United States we call the "West." Is there one "true" West? Or have the changes that are overwhelming most of the rest of the country so modified the West that there is little commonality? The editors of Different Roads believe, with Stephen R. Covey, that our "strength lies in differences, not in similarities," and we are constantly amazed by what Stanley Baldwin calls "the many-sidedness of truth." Many sides of the truth of the West are represented in the anthology. Is everything here absolutely the truth? The reader must decide.

Topics included in this collection of poetry, fiction and creative non-fiction range from the West's diversity of landscape, people, languages, attitudes and history to discussions of water issues, wildfires, antiquities and a broad range of environmental concerns.

Western Press Books is affiliated with with Western State Colorado University, produces one anthology annually focused on Western regional writing. The 2014 theme is "Western Diversity" and the title Different Roads comes from George R.R. Martin's quote above.

 

 

• Language: English
• Publisher: University Press of Colorado
• Release date: Sep 15, 2014
• ISBN: 9781607323655

Book preview

decide.

POETRY

Nina Bennett

Register Cliff, Wyoming

Names incised in the rock face

like signatures in a museum guest book.

Dirt swirls, sticks to my legs,

coats my sneakers as I circle the landmark,

search for indentations left in the limestone

over a hundred years ago

by people in pursuit of a dream

or trying to outrun a demon.

I kneel, press my palm over the wagon

wheel rut carved into the earth.

Buffalo bellow and snort;

the ground quivers beneath my hand

as the herd moves in unison.

Muffled moans of a woman in labor,

breathing measured as she attempts to delay

the birth until the protection of that night’s camp

is reached. Praying for the safe arrival of her first child,

she wants only to feel the weight in her arms

as her baby seeks the comfort of her breast.

She will wrap her son in a quilt

stitched during months of travel.

I crouch by the eroded ruts.

My fingers palpate the earth, take the pulse

of those who passed here long before.

The burden of unfulfilled promises,

endings and beginnings.

Prairie grass sways as the Oregon Trail

merges into the horizon, a discernible

break where the weight of wagons

left its mark, a permanent gouge

in the soul of the plains.

Blood courses through my fingertips

as I release the dirt back to the ground,

unable to distinguish my heartbeat

from that of the past.

Peter Bridges

Rancher

Lean man on strong brown mare dislikes the towns,

Fears cities whence crass millions may come camp

On his high fragile pastures. He rides rock crowns

Of mountains, turns home tired by moon’s mild lamp.

The rancher tells the moon that he is tired

Of snows, and taxes, worries over prices,

And fending off developers. He’s fired

Two hands for drugs; no place seems safe from vices.

The rancher’s son is bored and surfs the Web,

The rancher’s wife dreams winter on a beach,

The rancher’s love of country is at ebb

But he thinks of how his father used to teach

That we can create paradise again

Below these peaks, on this high flowering plain.

Joe Carvalko

County Road 80

Between Cordova and Truchas,

el hombre

looks skyward, wizened,

blinded by the sun’s flux,

in honor of that birth-marked

wiry muscled

clan clawing desiccated