Moonlight Ranch

On this ranch there were no whinnying horses neighing
the night away on a cool desert evening.

Or a Red Angus mother mooing imploringly for her
new-born baby bull to hurry up and join the herd.

Or fiddle-footed chickens clucking spasmodically
in anticipation of their morning bucket of
whole kernel corn long past due.

Or transient ranch hands, edgy drifters signed on
for a week's pay and nothing beyond.

Not even a chuckwagon cook slinging pewter plates of beans
and pouring cups of coarse coffee from a graniteware pot.   

On this ranch, outside Carson City, Nevada, inside a
moonlit doublewide, there were only prostitutes
and the loss of my virginity.