I am in the gas station watching the CRT television. I hand the cashier a hundred. Terrible smokes. He cashes the bill, takes snail shells from the till. Hands them to me.
Gun starts the horses. Bonobo has taken the lead. An upset. Kidney Bean dances slowly behind.
Smoke twists on itself, spiraling listlessly. First pack in years. The love of cigarettes is a barbarism. It is exercised at the expense of all others. The love of horses, too, is a barbarism.
Grey snake grows. The cherry glows with each careful puff. I ash into a snail shell, flick it into the parking lot. A pigeon pinwheels down, pecks it. Flies off.
Glass door agog. A young couple browsing, matching jackets with black spots. Fake eyes of butterfly wings. A warding off. A bluff.
It’s Majestic Franklin; he has pulled ahead. He is in the lead, fresh air, running glorious. His leg clips a clod. The jockey somersaults.
Fragile on his back. His legs tangled, bent at odd angles. But his hooves. His hooves, clasped together, stiff and reaching.
Myles Varga has an MFA in fiction from New Mexico State University, where he served as the Managing Editor for Puerto Del Sol. He has won first place for the 2024 Kevin Mcilvoy Creative Writing Endowed Fellowship. His work has appeared in Necessary Fiction, Folded Treasures, Organ Mountain Poets Society Anthology, and Poets for Science.