“Our child is coming!” your expectant lover might have said, so
your red hot-rod baby weaved right and left, always
headlong, until you slipped behind someone’s
grandmom, or another’s just-beginning firstborn, nervous—
more now—and their foot slides over the brake and breaks
momentum, and then I see a rancorous waving finger, another
hasty swerve just inches from my fender, wonder—
maybe there’s no newborn on the way, no tender dying spouse
to save, no righteous plea for this careless pace, just the scorching
impatience of your anger, and mine, now roused, radiating,
my voice and pressure climbing, clawed fingers curling
around the wheel like it’s your neck, my foot pressing down
like it’s on your face, just moments ago I prayed with Saint
Ephrem the Syrian, “Grant that I might see my own transgressions, and
judge not my brother,” but now I’m dropping f-bombs and burning gas, racing
alongside you on the road to hell, until a shadow falls dark and well and spooky over my
window—
a turkey vulture eyeing our demise, and I wake, slow, wait, give you all the space you need
to change your lane, change your mind, and breathe.