Word was she’d hitched west
from the tip of Kentucky to get
away from a man and twenty
acres of sorghum this drought
baked into dust. Her boom’s
gone bust was someone’s idea
of a joke, until the housekeeper
in Mayfield pulled a road atlas
and spent condoms from Super
8 linen. Its pages creased open
to Illinois: her chosen route
traced gray roads north, a faint
graphite x over Paris, the words
“truck stop” underscored with
three tiny hearts
where her lover
grinds awake to find the chrome
bulldog absent from his Mack,
where women with aspirations
spread salve onto the muscles
of grown men they call Baby,
where bean walkers piss steam
into the last half-hour before
dawn and zip themselves back
up in jeans, relieved and wet
with dreams. She’ll soon see
the fine patchwork of Chicago,
pastel shapes labeled with posh
names of suburbs she believes
are near enough to taste. Wave
to its satin skyline. Never reveal
which village is their own: sun
burn pink, lavender, faded peach.
With whom she won’t be found.
Until, back home, talk returns to
the brutal, unchangeable weather.
Todd Smith 