East of Center, after Sam Shepard
Your name doesn’t amble anything physical anymore
But we talked about you
Yesterday
Bebe
How the world is still the same
But your fine curl of life
Is wrapped around a few of us
Making us sometimes choke on your fur’s shadow, and
We smile
Like you couldn’t help but do
When seen in profile.
So many flies gather
In the center of the country
I think they are too small and
Too weak
To evade its gravity.
I pull to the left lane at every exit
So that I don’t get drawn down
Into it
Drive as fast as this rental car can
Approach the coast of safety.
Although it is night, and before the
Stars
Glare from the cars on the highway
Complete a hollow vacuum that I cannot conjure from my
Motel Bed
Where the lucid terror of hitting a stationary object at
Eighty miles per hour
Is too abstract
For a mind picture exploding into threads
Of long paste, light enough to
Float
Through the windshield
Protected like the memory of upholstery foam.