Last chance

Su Croll

How is a town like a fable?

How is a highway like a song?

How the Rosebud River is a message

you find yourself

crossing again and again

like the eleven bridges to a ghost town

in south central Alberta ending

at the Last Chance Saloon

with its pair of documented ghosts

on its meager upper floors,

with its grease-fried meat

and windows dotted with aimless

crawling flies in its dining

room crowded with tin

signs from the forties and junk toys

you covet and are mesmerized by.

An old timey band box 

with its wind-up players

and a mechanical Elvis

music box that jerks and gyrates

until the works run down

and the proprietress of the place

leads you back to your chair

and serves you up sausages and fried eggs

then refills your coffee cup

for the fourth or fifth time.