Highway Town

Sauerkraut festival, sauerkraut ice cream from a tiny paper cup.

Places you could get lost in. Bike path that wound by the old airport,

abandoned playground with its huddle of  bouncy animals

on their oversized springs. In the slough, Doritos bags

flashed from the mud like kingfishers. Blackberry lane.

We held hands as we biked up the hill, nine miles back

in time for dinner. I was as lonely as anyone, I suppose. The pastures

full of yellow daisies. Blackberry thorn he drew across his forearm

when I raised my voice. Newly built house that was empty, dark-tinted

windows staring lidlessly into the cedars’ lined trunks. He said

the owner’s wife had cheated, left before they could move in.

An abandoned Caterpillar flaked yellow paint into the weeds.

Its giant conveyor-belt wheels like something smashed, or smashing. Vines

twisted into the cab, its rusted skeleton seat. I loved the wreck, the ruin.

The myths that lingered in sidewalk cracks

like dandelions. The girl who’d gotten pregnant

slowly pushing her baby on the park’s new swing set.

That awful beige & green.