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So Many Americans, Driving Late on Country Roads
The most likely time for a fatal automobile accident is
one a.m. Sunday morning. Often these accidents involve
a single car with one passenger.
Newspaper article
It's always this place that calls you. You
turn a corner at the edge of town,
the wheel in your hands the outline of a shape
you no longer understand.
Like the dozens of drivers all over America
who parallel you tonight on other country roads,
you stare though a horizon of curved glass:
the asphalt deepens into a starless sky.
Your wallet is full; you believe you could accelerate
for years. You don't realize you're following a blinking line
of drivers, their names in smeared ink
of Monday morning obituaries.
Their histories yellow in basements,
like your headlights fading beyond the gravel shoulder.
The speedometer turns over. The dashboard
flares. This place always calls
you, its voice softer
than your velour seats, calls you
to close your eyes
and meet it head on.
It's the simple end that is best.
Beyond that first sharp curve,
a single tree waits.
Never a witness. Perhaps
a lone dog whose ears straighten at the
impact. It limps the other direction,
deeper into woods, while twigs
tick like an overheated engine cooling.