This Is My Highway
A codependent love poem
My lonely highway, nothing but sky,
rocks and dirt, that’s how abandoned.
That’s where you find me, like a leaf in the wind.
With your hands, you dig a little place in the ground for my feet.
To keep me safe.
To steady me.
Facing west, you take my hands.
I give them to you, looking east.
We stare into each other as
I put my feet into the place that you made for them.
Now, dear, you are my everything.
And then.
A distant hum, from the west.
Behind me.
“What is that?” I ask.
“Nothing,” your eyes search past me, scanning the western sky.
Relief. Laughter. We fill silence with stories.
With secrets. My ears full with flattery.
With promises.
But when you sleep…
I hear it.
Constant. Approaching.
In the morning, I question,
“Can’t you hear that?”
“Stop it. There is nothing.”
I pretend to believe you.
But my ears will not let me.
Finally, I turn my head as if to look over my shoulder, to see.
Your voice pierces me with the weight of the past.
“Don’t you trust me!?”
“I’m sorry!”
How cruel I feel. To even look.
Now I keep my eyes fixed upon you.
Never turning.
What do I need eyes for, when I have yours?
Yet that sound…
Louder. Closer.
So we mask it.
Louder. Longer. Laughing.
Drowning all sound.
But I can still hear it.
I think you can hear it too. Maybe.
Though you are pretending not to,
to make me feel better.
Or to fool me.
I’m not sure which.
You don’t look into my eyes anymore.
You look past me, into the distance,
toward whatever it is.
“Just tell me. Please.”
“Stop!” you hiss. “There is nothing!”
You put your arm around my waist,
whispering your forgiveness, you excuse my questions.
He is going to save me, I think.
He will save us.
You covered my feet with soil. To steady me, you said,
when I needed that.
When did I need that?
The ground rumbles.
A truck? A train? A stampede?
I do not know what.
But it is coming.
It is coming.
I know it now.
Surely it will turn.
It will see us here, it will slow down.
It will brake.
Your forehead furrows.
I feel your dread.
So I comfort you,
refusing to turn.
Proving my trust
handing my life over to you.
After all, you are on this road with me. We are here together.
My feet are covered with your soil.
“It sounds like a truck. Is there a truck coming?”
You stammer.
You tell me the history of trucks. We discuss your need for glasses, and your difficulty seeing things in the distance. We share stories of childhood, of making truck drivers blow their horns by pumping our fists.
I listen. We laugh. Pretending.
My worry, consuming me,
drowning me.
Finally — I gasp for air —
“We need to run! It isn’t safe here!”
You yank your hands from mine,
“How dare you!”
you step backwards, backwards —
I lunge for you —
but my feet have rooted here,
where you covered them in soil.
I sway, falling forward, my hands hit the dirt.
I can no longer stand without your arms to steady me.
That’s when I see it.
My nightmare. Worse.
Black and steaming, angry and gaseous,
crashing down my highway,
dirt filling the air.
It is coming.
I do not try to dig my feet out.
There is not time for that.
I wait.
I wait for it.
I brace myself.
If I brace myself, surely it won’t hurt me.
Since I heard it coming? I brace myself.
I’ll be okay, I’ll be —
Blood mixed with dirt.
Tons. Tens of tons.
Crushing.
My highway red,
soaking
with all I ignored.
I am mud, nothing more.
Yet I think . . .
What you did not know, dear,
is that I was looking behind you, too.
While you were laughing, talking, lying,
you never turned to look over your shoulder,
to the east,
to see
the cliff that you were perched upon.
You thought you steadied me.
But it was me who steadied you.
Now the only sound I hear
is you
falling
all I feared
careening down
down, far from my highway.
This is my highway
where the red dirt dries, and
blows around like a leaf in the wind.
Like I always wanted.
