Travel

A poem for America

Photo by Chris Offutt

Travel

I almost ask the frail Indian girl,
her dark eyes and skin withering

beneath the fluorescent light 
of the Phillips 66. But I don’t. 

I hand her my money and leave
remembering the shape of her face,

the weight of her gaze on my back.
It is five days into the New Year

and I think of the year that’s past
like a town I’ve driven out of,

a town where, if I had had the chance, 
I would have worked my life 

the way a man might work 
a piece of wood, mindful 

of the blade, working the knife 
away from the body until 

a face appears, then hands, 
then fingers, and he is not alone.