MidwesternNightsDream


The air was soup
as I sipped
through
my black-tar lungs
beating time
down I-44

And on the horizon was Everest incarnate.

A giant moon,
sherbet orange
sinking into the flatlands
beyond the Mississippi
as the billboards winked
         
                                       and giggled
                       
                                                                               and bled across my vision.
                                     
                                                           

I laughed with giddy insurrection-

It's the end of the world, babe--I said.

I know....she said
and kept driving,
Missouri soup
kissing our faces.

It's the End-of-the-World-Moon.

White lines gave chase along side me
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i
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and a dying moon setting
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I could smell the hops
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tasted the river-air
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You lie with your eyes.....
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she said.
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I know
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But I'm just looking at you.


And we drove towards the dying globe,
a never-changing mass
of rock
and dust
that screamed across our eyes
in an infinite descent
of magnanimous meaning
and significance
so that we forgot
who we were
and where we were going,
suspended by white lines
and diesel and wonder
while sweet meadow-grass
hummed against my nostrils.

I put my hand on her thigh
and closed my eyes
as we drove
towards inferno,
each seeking
to stay in place--
suspended on an axis
of open sky
and dotted lines
under the sick moon
of my weeping gaze.