Undoing Massachusetts
by Julia Remick
The rearview mirror
bounces dusk
above ventriloquial motorists
as we wind fast
from the light
horn, brakes mute.
Strings of commuters coil in
as through a child's free cereal
straw.
We begin
to triangle out of the city
secure in the simplicity
of fifth gear.
He, who ignores my face,
talks through my eyes
(but would hesitate to identify their
color), smirks at southbound lanes,
forehead pushing the windshield
against my concentration.
State lines from now one
at a motel
named after some odd-numbered
interstate,
I will slide
from sleep to his mouth
and back,
cling away the miles.
Cling hard
to not consider
the backwash of Boston
spiraling down
the Tobin Bridge.