Gary Condit

We went and left the dog on the highway median

Glaring sky to map microbial floaters against

But it grew dark as we sat ‘hind a car that wouldn’t let us pass

The child in the back wouldn't quit waving her doll’s arm

I said “from the age of six this boy did not want to live”

The passing of time hasn’t changed your dad’s pained expression

I felt our diners and our movie theaters in poisoned nighttimes

Intumescent and crawling

Nonlocalized awakenings

Memory’s strange abbreviation

In that other time before I knew you

My parents fell asleep bathed in wavering blue

Some breathing dogwood trees lined the street

Swaying white and pink

Carpeting the canopied hall

The shared nightmare of your shut room on a rail

Through the absence in the morning

Hole in histories

We made for some show

Pulled off to the side when rain came prismatic, spreading the headlights

Then you drove me home

Is it teeth-shaking polyphony, grace, and completion?

Or nothing?