Privileged as I was to pass through the country
on a slick set of foreign rubber
to tick the machinery in my eyes
as they gather the light
of endless mars landscapes,
I listen for signs of life in my trunk.
Drawn into erosion
by tumult of the insects
and forever a slave
to the unbelievable power
of time and water,
a blur in my mind now,
colors of road signs
and weathered dead wood billboards
of an abandoned era
looking on and showing me a world
that just up and left.
Seeds in the desert somehow stayed
and folded out from their shells
in a harsh ground to finally feel
the heavenly touch
of the scorching sun,
millions of them,
reaching up and out from the cracks in the dry dirt
in an unbelievable effort for life.
I think about my life
while I pass the border checkpoint.
Takes my ID.
Asks me where I'm going.
Nevada I say.
Dead tires and gas station leftovers
are strung about the highway shoulders
like blood clots in an asphalt vein,
my mind in civil war
in the air conditioned import box of synthetic material
and oil combustion,
I take note somehow,
myself convinced I have the poet's eye
one needs to eat up such miserable scatter.
Like a dust devil
I toss sandy debris as I cross dirt,
I chip at my teeth
with the barrel of my gun
as I flirt with the future
of the snitch in my trunk.
