American Animal

Pull over here—it’s some kind of gas station

Antique store hybrid, you can tell by the Church

In the truck bed of the Chevy-Jeep parked slantways

Across the lawn. I’ll be the homesick wife, young

And strawberry-flavored, and you the scattered

Academic who looks at the sky when talking About F. Scott. Yes, it’s mighty blue today,

The way nothing is until it—it—hits you.

Come on. Don’t dally. We’ll nab something nice

And heavy with gilt edges we can both grasp

With both hands and for one purebred moment

You, this thing, and I will be somewhere unique

To us, and isn’t it all terrifically subdued

Against the surly promises of history?