DRIVE

Tank full but feeling capital-red-E empty,

            I pick up 40W.

      Sun falls

            behind the blue ridge

                  and shadows flood Asheville

      till I’m clavicle-deep

            in dark, tryna shake

regret’s black symbiote.

      The mountain line against the sky

            is drawn like Avril’s

                        upper lip—

galactic philtrum so pretty

            I could scream:

                  the seamless ombre fade

                        from white to peach,

      Uranian blue, then blue, then

                        bad bruise blue,

                  and I swear

      if you can’t see it,

            you can sense the earth’s curve,

her shape, and like Turner says:

                  her side-boob in space…

Pisgah leans into Mitchell’s nape

                  to watch my high-beams

            incise Appalachia.

      I am hell’s zipper. V6 Beelzebub,

                              dog-bad

            with a belly of fire

and a phosphene green dial.

Velocity is shotgun in satin,

      mathematicless and too cool

                        to care

how fast we’re going

            or how soon we’ll get

                  to wherever that is.

            I’m still hunting my heart’s gearshift,

a leather nub I can touch

      and throw

            that’ll make me change.

But for now the pedal is enough:

                  ever-yes gasoline sender

      says okay when I press it,

                  ferries fuel

                              to the core

                  and never asks why.

Over this road, I’m as hidden

            as a xenomorph’s eye,

soul so two-toned

      you could call me an orca.

So I feed the throttle,

            check my mirrors:

      what’s behind me

            is still closer than it appears.