Stake Mission

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Their place was a junkyard with Joshuas,
and they’d play Mom and Pop 

to any delinquent on the desert. 
We’d be forever having 

the first discussion in the front room, 
while skinheads rifled the fridge. 

Their daughter had boobs 
that defied gravity—like Brother Bill said, 

it strengthened your testimony to be there;
and we had hopes for them, until the night 

their rowdy son beat his sister’s boozer
boyfriend past waking up, 

and they all panicked and piled 
in the truck and drove fifty miles out 

for a hasty memorial on the hardpan.
Miraculously, rockhounds found him. 

Then the cops came, with iron questions,
and we were released.