‘fuck.   how’d we even get here  ?’

     I don’t know.

                             over the schuylkill?

                             through northerdawns & bleeding jetlag

     ,all the memories starch stiff between the sheets of

     hippocampal petrifaction–

     ::the /in/significance between    then)&(now

or maybe it was that lefthand turn back there at the gas station where the Mexican guy, buried in clothes, filled the tank for us as the consequence of some government program I didn’t understand, and we hurtled down Monmouth Rd past the frightened trees and weatherbeat saltbox houses wilting at the intersection ….

     before the hopeless threepointturn

     + (di)still of the fluttering whiskey flakes

     filtered through sundown      

ran my fingers through a                    bonewhite snowfall

;got up & breaking the ribs of an      open      jersey plain

 

     we drank bitter coffee, & i fumbled through some

     recollections of Walden Pond       

                                                          wedged between

     the concord turnpike                +                   a giftshop

     so i could misquote what i’d read on the cape about

     new clothes,new men,the bare spines of shipwrecks

 

 

Originally submitted for publication in Woroni’s Creative Edition.

Illustrations by Abigail Widijanto.