you bring the hamburger buns, i'll bring the baked beans

Rez scenes: three young boys in the back of a pickupwith big toothy smiles and shirts flapping, staring atme over the hood as they pass on their way up theAshland Divide - a black dog with a brown mask aroundthe eyes prancing in the ditch as busted out carsstream by on Lame Deer's streets - big burn swaths surround the courts where i play basketball and look across a field of pathetic charcoaled tree trunks that witness a swishhere and a clank there, and tiny little sprigs ofgreen shoot up hopefully, with clear burn linesthat show where people stood encircled around a housein the distance keeping the flames at bay - studentshere for volleyball and football practice sprawledacross the quads, laughing and running and throwingpinecones at each other - wisps of smoke rise in thedistant hills, the morning after a big lightning stormrolled through and made a car alarm go off down thestreet, which i stood outside and watched pass over -Ernie, w/ big bulbous alcoholic nose and the unsteadywalk, wipes his hands on his red shirt and walks outfrom underneath the alcove of the store to beg forchange to buy a forty, laughing the whole time - theladies at the bank who give me a shit b/c i'm youngand unmarried and tease me about taking out money onFridays and ask "Well what are you up to? I bet nogood." and covering their mouths, they laugh so hard -deer shit (small circular pellets) and four stepslater, I look across the meadow, three deer, cluelessfor a half a second and then pogo-ing away from mewith large white tails waving a goodbye.