The Torn-Up Road

1
There is no way to make this story interesting.
A pause, a road, the taste of grave in the mouth. The rocks dig into my skin
like arrowheads.
And then the sense of being smothered underneath a sack of lentils
or potatoes, or of a boat at night slamming into the docks again
without navigation, without consideration,
heedless of the planks of wood that are the dock,
that make up the berth itself.

2
I want to tell you this story without having to confess anything,
without having to say that I ran out into the street to prove something,
that he didn't love me,
that I wanted to be thrown over, possessed.
I want to tell you this story without having to be in it:
Max in the wrong clothes. Max at the party, drunk again.
Max in the kitchen, in refrigerator light, his hands around the neck of a beer.
Tell me we're dead and I'll love you even more.
I'm surprised that I say it with feeling.
There's a thing in my stomach about this. A simple thing. The last rung.

3
Can you see them there, by the side of the road,
not moving, not wrestling,
making a circle out of the space between the circles? Can you see them
pressed into the gravel, pressed into the dirt, pressing against each other
in an effort to make the minutes stop --
headlights shining in all directions, night spilling over them like
gasoline in all directions, and the dark blue over everything, and them
holding their breath --

4
I want to tell you this story without having to say that I ran out into the street
to prove something, that he chased after me
and threw me into the gravel.
And he knew it wasn't going to be okay, and he told me
it wasn't going to be okay.
And he wouldn't kiss me, but he covered my body with his body
and held me down until I promised not to run back out into the street again.

But the minutes don't stop. The prayer of going nowhere
going nowhere.

5
His shoulder blots out the stars but the minutes don't stop. He covers my body
with his body but the minutes
don't stop. The smell of him mixed with creosote, exhaust --
There, on the ground, slipping through the minutes,
trying to notch them. Like taking the same picture over and over, the spaces in between sealed up --
Knocked hard enough to make the record skip
and change its music, setting the melody on its
forward course again, circling and circling the center hole in the flat black disk.
And words, little words,
words too small for any hope or promise, not really soothing
but soothing nonetheless.