***
i have rushedly not made
enough time for things;
and have along the way
missed (from vinyl bus seats watching
whizzing by) blurs of loveliest
loneliest pinks, browns, greens,
which (imagination tells me) might
from arm’s breadth burn my retinas out with placid beauty.
only faintly have i caught with flaring
nose the drips and dews and bounces of things, chased (like
gathering air in a cheesecloth) fleetingly up and off by
gasoline fumes. pattering off the windows like
pebble rain ping the notes of some glad
hymn, wafting lofting up from the chorus of a
country church; they ricochet glancingly, as bullets, off
ears made too of window glass, and shatter under the
burn of engine hum. (and o how i long now to
shout to him to stop this lumbering husk) but
we are far past now. these things i long to see,
now that it is too late. i turn to the one with whom i
boarded, and find her
gone, and the seat empty and
cold. only once have i closed my eyes
for reasons other than
to sleep.
***
