THE CARS

THE CARS

The cars have something to do with it—the mystery, the heartache.
It’s a way of thinking, driving. Also a viewpoint and an analgesic.
On my street, cars drive fast because there’s no speed bumps.
The driveway is the entrance to this world. I’m often outside,
weeding my driveway, a joke I make with my friends
who live in lush places with their homes surrounded by forests and gardens.
I own a six-space parking lot, I tell them. People walk past,
bicycles trip the motion detector lights, skateboards, double cab trucks,
in the early summer evenings the aroma of charcoal lighter fluid.
Patrol cars coast down the center of the wide street.
We drive. We fluoresce.