Chupacabra Listens to Conjunto

Clarence Wolfshohl

July 28, 2024

With the bajo sexto’s bounce

he taps his toe, claws pitching

up divots of caliche. He shimmies

from the waist down with the 

accordion’s wheezing swirls.

He imagines he is Gregorio Cortez

pursued by los rinches across

south Texas—Sequin to Eagle Pass—

one horizon ahead of the pursuing

posse of corrido gringos.

Or with Los Pingueños del Norte

desperate in the brush—el desesperado—

for food, for love, and for home,

running to the beat of ranchera

just one boracho perdido.

He dreams he has gone to San Antonio

and hangs out on West Commerce—

Viva el West Side—trying to see

the ghost of Lydia Mendoza in the bottom

of a long neck Lone Star.

But it is Monday, and Chupacabra

is just west of Cotulla, and the polka

fades on the air waves. Back to the grind,

sniffing cabrito on the hoof

in lonely arroyos.

Native of San Antonio, Clarence Wolfshohl has been active in the small press as writer and publisher for sixty years.  More recently, he has published in Southwest American Literature, The Mailer Review, New Texas, New Letters, and Texas Poetry Assignment.