Shortstack

Adrian Carroll, Burleigh Seaver, Mike Pahn, and Scott Gursky are thieves. Time-warped bluesmen in patriotic garb, joking as a jolly, threatless group at the crossroads in the distance. Upon approach, your dust-parched throat tightens… You’d anticipated directions, a cup of water. Instead, without a word, the boys saunter to a low, rickety plywood soapbox, hands in pockets, staring at you, and the music of the hi-lo country floats in from the distance. As your knees weaken and you sit, you find others around you similarly beguiled and helpless. A hat salesman; a truckload of roughnecks; Mrs Cooper from Langford. It becomes difficult to see. Riders gallop through, their mounts wild-eyed and frothing, and hurl instruments; through dancing heat waves you see the band take their positions. The music crescendos, and a wind from the surrounding cornfields blows in--stories whose children are tales, grandchildren yarns. Train whistles from the east, daggers from the west, cities on fire in the north. And to the south, mountains and hollows. Dreams carefully grown in lost dales and sent forth as reminders. Telling you, whispering, “Decide,” and in a rush, bending to absorb the impact, the band catches up.