I suspect you sleep now to the insistent whinny,
night nickering of wild horses—the ones
you swore could never drag you away.
Blonde palominos, freckled Appaloosas,
Spanish mustangs nuzzling
at that dark crescent of your neck
that was once my saltlick alone.
They will never know the pull of the bit,
prick of the spur, but still you dream
you ride them, through red deserts,
hidden folds of the mountains. I listen
for the hammer of hooves at your pulse points,
feel the sting and heat of each tail flick
that teases down arroyos where I cannot follow.
–
Melanie McCabe is the author of four books of poems, most recently the forthcoming All The Signs Were There, which won the Longleaf Press Poetry Prize. Her debut novel Road Longer Than Memory will be out from Oceanview Publishing in June of 2026. Her memoir, His Other Life: Searching For My Father, His First Wife, and Tennessee Williams, won the 2016 University of New Orleans Press Prize.
© 2025, Melanie McCabe
Halfway Down the Stairs 