rdking.net

Illumination

The young woman bending at roadside
was both attractive and distraught,

wringing her hands and throwing them
down in spasms of sickness and emotion.

She was hysterical at having just car-hit
a four-point buck.  How easy for this world

to drive you through someone's despair;
how suddenly it pierces you—nameless

and instinctive, as if only the reminder
was, in itself, the terror and focal point:

wall-eyed headlights and a busted grille,
hands wrung white, the buck's black eye.

             back | ToC | next