Poemusart of the Day

Mountain Killers

Music by Dust Hollow · Poem by Thomson, Thomas Barclay · Art by Garrett Hale

The Poem

Mountain Killers by Thomson, Thomas Barclay

The rifle held steady on the heart of Sim Satterlee, who killed Lars Swensen and walked free from the courthouse not a day before. Below the rock where Olaf lay in wait, his brother's murderer stood frozen on the trail, one hand creeping toward the pistol in his overalls. "Say your prayers, murderer, for now you die!" But the silence stretched, and the trigger held. Olaf staggered to his feet, arms flung skyward, the rifle clattering down the slope. "Ay can't do it! Lars, you hear me? Ay tried, but Ay can't!" In the great pine above, the starving cougar leapt. Sim's hand flashed to his breast and the forty-five roared twice, but the beast struck square, and the two killers, man and cat, went down together in a snarl of claws and blood. Olaf crawled to his stricken enemy, gibbering thanks to the man who saved his life. Sim raised himself on one elbow, reached for the fallen gun, and sank back. "Hell," he muttered. "Missed ya with my last shot." And as he had lived, so Sim died, spurning all grace, denying that even for one moment he had been a man.

About the Poem

Thomas Barclay Thomson’s “Mountain Killers” is a grim Western revenge drama that twists expectations of justice and redemption. The scene unfolds on a mountain trail where Olaf, rifle trained on Sim Satterlee—the man who murdered his brother Lars and walked free from court—struggles to pull the trigger. Just as Olaf throws down his weapon, unable to kill, a starving cougar attacks from above. Sim shoots the beast, but both man and cat die in a bloody tangle. Olaf crawls to thank his enemy for saving his life, only for Sim to weakly reach for his fallen gun and mutter that he missed his last shot at Olaf. The poem’s mood is stark and merciless, exploring how ingrained hatred can deny even a dying man a moment of grace. Sim’s final refusal to acknowledge his own humanity seals his fate, leaving the reader with a chilling meditation on pride, vengeance, and the cost of a hardened soul.

About the Music

Mountain Killers by Dust Hollow

Dust Hollow’s Mountain Killers is a slow-burning piece of dark Americana folk that conjures the tense, gritty solitude of a mountain wilderness. At roughly 65 BPM, the track unfolds in a somber minor key, building an atmosphere of foreboding like a standoff in a remote hollow. Acoustic slide guitar weaves a mournful, wavering melody over muted banjo picking and a low, droning fiddle that hums with unease. Sparse percussion from a brushed snare adds a quiet, restless heartbeat. The instrumentation feels raw and weathered, evoking a sound similar to the stark, cinematic folk of William Tyler or the darker corners of The Dead South. Each element layers steadily, tightening the mood until the piece feels less like a song and more like a slow, inevitable confrontation with the land itself—gritty, somber, and utterly isolated.

About the Art

Mountain Killers by Garrett Hale

Garrett Hale’s woodcut print “Mountain Killers” presents a tense vertical composition set in the 1920s American frontier. The dramatic print uses bold black lines and a limited earth-tone palette of burnt sienna, raw umber, and deep forest green against cream paper. In the upper third, a weathered Scandinavian man with pale blond hair lies prone atop a granite boulder, his long rifle aimed downward at the trail. His grim, tormented expression contrasts with the terror on the face of a lanky black-whiskered man below, frozen mid-stride beside pack mules, hand drifting toward a hidden revolver. Above them all, a gaunt mountain lion crouches in a ponderosa pine, golden eyes fixed on the scene. Harsh midday light carves deep shadows across striated canyon walls. The layered vertical arrangement and cinematic tension evoke the stark narrative style of classic American woodcut illustration.

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