Photo by Patrick Schöpflin on Unsplash
Grain Valley, MO
We’re 1.5 miles from Whiskey Tango. Unless you cross the highway.
Remember Beverlie Tracy, murdered in a small town? We went to high school
with her sister Jennifer. They never found the guy. There’s a Crossroads
Baptist Church in the old library; they knocked down the school. Here lies
asbestos, no air conditioning, 1907-1995.
We had a funeral in the gym once. Go Eagles.
Rest in peace cheerleading tryouts and Burnie Norris.
Now, you can get McMuffins all day
and McRibs in November. Loving it—
breakfast, lunch, and dinner in brown paper
bags that replaced heavy trays and cardboard cartons of milk.
Size mattered—north of town, after the Osage Indians,
before the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade,
back when Lincoln was president.
Named in 1945, counted into pairs, born
of the Louisiana Territory, the municipality’s survived by
Kara Eaker, Olympic gymnast. Remember Josh, who jumped
off a bridge somewhere in Australia,
class of ‘96? Sounds of the times:
the racetrack on Mondays, Fridays’ cowbells
and the crowd on their feet. Go Eagles!
Stay right in, and fight till the very end!
These valleys, grain, and dead cattle, supposed to be
non-profit role models for farmers,
for 30 years. Fight, fight, fight!
Not allowed to leave campus,
we’d race across two lanes, the only asphalt in town;
the victors, huddled, earned cigarettes and hard ice cream.
The losers paid their dues. Back when there were phone booths.
Back when we had one football field. Five
grocery stores in five years. If you’re hungry,
there’s the old Mexican restaurant or the new one
on Main St. Rest in peace, chocolate and menthol;
rest in peace, community garden.
The truckstop runs this town. The interstate,
diesels, and out-of-state plates
harass the $10 plots, new empty cocoons,
time capsules that can’t predate the bank,
won’t applaud the strip mall,
or the railroad tracks where kids
scratch at iron dust and make sanguine pacts
to last. Best friends forever. Stay in touch.
Cecilia Savala is a student at the University of Central Missouri where she is majoring in English Education and creative writing and serves as the Editor in Chief of Arcade Magazine. Her work has recently appeared or is forthcoming in Pleiades, Barrelhouse, and The Boiler Journal, among others.