High Horse

Friday Night, Tascosa

for ‘Chelle

Not like the killers
spitting into Whataburger cups,
emptying themselves trying
to be hard as the land,
you keep a word
between lip and gum
and swallow your spit,
saving yourself for the moment
when the pony tails swishing
from the backs of baseball caps
stomp down from the bleachers
in a Great Migration
to join legs and necks waiting
beyond the stadium pawing
the black Llano stretching
away from boys under lights
to a freedom
with nothing to prove.

Matt Thomas is a smallholder farmer, engineer, and poet. His recent work can be found in Ponder Review, Cleaver Magazine, and The Broken Plate. ‘Disappearing by the Math,’ a full-length collection, was published by Silver Bow in 2024. ‘Cicada, Dog & Song’, a second full-length collection, will be published by Serving House Books in 2026. He lives with his family in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia.