Bodark County is a collection of poems told in the voices of several characters living on the Llano Estacado using the natural lyricism of colloquial speech to capture the essence of life in the rural West.

"George Perreault brings us into a world of party lines, dogs, and late night country radio stations, all in a language rich with image and resonant of a lost America."  -- Gailmarie Pahmeier, Reno Poet Laureate.

"The poems of Bodark are beautifully wrought, and a sheer joy to read." -- Jeffrey Alfier, Blue Horse Press.

"These triumphant poems are warm, red soil between our toes."  -- Todd Pederson, Sleet Magazine.



Nancy Turnbough: The Quilting Bee

Then they got onto the subject of phones,  Verna saying:
Our number way the heck back, when I was a little kid, it was
long short long.  You remember how they had just started up
and how you had to listen careful, like it was a telegraph?

And naturally that got Dolores going again: Well, we were
out on the Criswell ranch in those days, and ours was
long long short, and us kids were never ever supposed to
pick it up -- I recall that for darn sure -- just let'r ring.

Then we got numbers, remember?  Mine was 855, no ... 35 --
835.  Who'd have thought that?  I can't remember the first boy
who kissed me, I swear I can't, but 835 ... the way my fingers
pulled up round the circle, released, the dial click-clicking back

and waiting, you had to wait like it was water in the irrigation ditch,
the early fields closed off, then finally opening into the right pasture.
And I bet you all remember party lines too, spying on others and
everyone always wondering if someone else was listening in --

all ears, you know -- and how folks would talk in their own codes?
Well, of course, we did it too, stories layered under stories
like Bible studies, all hidden meanings and secret sins.  That's
where I first heard Becky Hollingsworth was pregnant, and

how everyone thought it was the Butler kid, but then one day
I heard her with another boy and he was the one really done it.
Well, yes, she did marry into the Butlers -- their ranch and the
Hollingsworth place together, that just made more sense -- and Becky

she made him a good wife and they did right well, real nice family.
I don't guess he ever knew the truth of it, and after all these years
what difference does it make?  Bobby raised that boy up, they're
running a pretty stout herd, and that other feller -- well, he's long gone.

And, no, I ain't saying he's dead and I ain't saying he's not -- just
you know how it goes around here.  We each got our lives and we
live 'em out, and if we're lucky someone will care enough to keep
that damn Johnson grass from growing over our graves.

That's all I'm saying, except this is supposed to be a quick nine-block
account of that Brackett girl's gonna pop any day now, but next week
I could use some company maybe getting over Amarillo for some fat quarters
else I'll never get my jubilee rose done for the Bodark County Fair.