Interstate Slow-Burn
by oscar Lledo Osborn
Today we don’t mind the traffic. We look together,
the sun low over the snaking interchange,
schools of brake lights like soft ripples
on a sullen, moon-scaled river. We crawl with
the windows down, in silent, accustom awe
at the semi-trucks looming alongside.
Between us, the silence of the second summer back home,
the haze from the first familiar licks of lighter-flame.
The smoke bends and warps unwillingly as I ease
off the brake. If we could stand the mosquitoes,
we’d wait in the breakdown lane
for the sun to drown in steel and concrete,
and sit on the trunk, watching the still-water
asphalt spirit strangers through the night.