Making Good Time

We needed gas money in a bad way. We pulled off at a truck stop, and she went with her boyfriend into the mercury glow. Through the windshield, I watched as he stood behind her and lifted her purple kitty T-shirt for the truckers. He was right, she did have tits like teacups.

Mission de la Luz

Dinner was elbow macaroni and ground beef in a thin brown sauce. As we ate, they gave us a sermon on the Santa Cruz, saint of the cross. Later, I climbed into my bunk and pulled the sheet over the paper pajamas we were made to wear. In minutes, I was the only one with open eyes in the room of sawing men.

Wednesday

The bus driver came from the office and told us the mountains were closed because of the snow. An Indian flung his coffee against the wall, his eyes all wet. I went outside to see Cheyenne. The wind tore a paper turkey from the door of a bar and threw it down the street.

Hitchhike California

Very late in the night, the hippies let us off by the side of the road. We climbed over the guardrail and stumbled through the dunes, bags over our shoulders. I kicked away some pieces of drift and collapsed in the sand. She found a place near the waves, watched the wide eyes of the seals watch her.

The Devil's Boots

He came off the road when he saw our campfire. Hair gathered in knots, his eyes had seen and sowed a country of misery. He claimed to collect welfare in 10 different states, wives in 4. I nudged the burning end of a log with my toe and contemplated the providence of hell.

Flat in Alberta

Along both sides of the empty road, the tow-headed wheat flayed in the wind. A white slab of marble stuck in the earth listed the victims of cholera. With her fingertips, she traced Ezekial's name. If any, she reasoned, his was the spirit to summon a man with a jack.

Last 900 Miles

Crossing the Cuyahoga, a semi folded in half. In jeans and a cap, the driver somersaulted through the windshield, over the guardrail, and made for the valley below. The travelers gathered in the cubes of broken glass. I looked over the empty air and the flowering tops of the trees; nowhere to be found, he must have become starling and flown.