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Texas Tango to tango. He says boleo and I follow my foot up as if the leg attaches to the long blonde, as if there really is a heaven until I think it won’t come down but feels like her foot stretching for the gas pedal, measuring the miles between telephone poles as if it matters how far she has come, how far any of us have come. She called to say she saw you leaving the Alamo with all its bloody honor. At least she thought it was you; she couldn’t see your eyes. I say I’m too old, but Raul says no one is ever too old for the tango. He says gancho, and I wrap my leg around him and feel the sweat between us like love. The blonde feels sweat in her motel room outside Killeen with only a swamp cooler and no ice, wearing nothing but rhinestones like chains around her neck. I hear static on the line, dry lightning, and she says she listens for your motorcycle idling in the parking lot with no vacancy stuttering above, missing like a broken heart. Raul says parada and I watch his foot travel toward mine like long distance, like a thunderstorm, an electrical charge. We are the only bodies in focus and even the phone ringing on the bar is only playing counterpoint to the dance. It’s the blonde, of course, coughing on enough dry desert to turn into the dust you left hanging over the road. She says you’re not alone leaving, a woman loving your back. Arrestre, arrestre. Raul drags my feet like you drag my heart, and I lean south toward the border I’m afraid to cross. The blonde drags me over phone lines once thought as extinct as the rhinestones better than stars reflecting the sum of your eyes. Call me. Call me. The young woman drags you like a magnet arrested between poles. Raul and I tango between night and day, dancing on sweat running like rivers between my breasts. Raul steps into my space and I cry sacada. The blonde drives into the space of Chihuahua Desert, eyes filled with Marfa Lights. I back into Pecos and Marathon; she opens a P.O. box in Valentine thinking her heart might be there but finds only hot West Texas wind. You, you, are your eyes finally laughing? Boleo, and we reach for the black phone ringing on the bar freezing us in whatever space we can find.
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