Pelican Tracks

And Redeye Gravy with Everything

 And Redeye Gravy with Everything Back in the Midwest, after the snowmad rise Through the mountains of Kentucky, the tall trucks Sucking past in a spume of delirious wheels, The whole highway run amuck, wiper blades Slaphappy at the streaks of salt and slop, And ahead, two hundred tired miles to home. We stop to gas up at a crossroads diner, Tables of fat women buttering their chins, drivers Hollow-eyed at the slippery end of the meal, Skid marks of bacon, eggs sliding across the plate, And crankcase coffee only the dead could drink— An hour of sweet amnesia from the lethal road. And we think, why come back to this winterbeaten state, Whose motto must be The bland leading the bland? There’s not much call for okra in Akron, or crawfish in Kent, Or pancakes paved with the blackstrap tar of molasses. Even the border drawl from the hills has gone mute, extinct As the Carolina parakeet and the carbonated warbler. And why come back before the Ice Age retreats, a trip That’s close to steering down a long sleeve of silk, The heater’s breath like a small dog panting up your leg? We pay the bill and scrape the windshield clean, Still trembling from the tight grind of clutch and squint, Knuckles so white they glow like raw bone. ...