Connections
let your mind hook
everything up a string
of boxcars hitching
screwdrivers to paperclips
to stove bolts
zippers to closet hangers
the earring lost
on the plane as you pass
each station of the train
the dozen pencils
the crate of floor tiles
the way he smiled
the first
husband the third
child
the grandmother
who was lame
they’re all there
in your brain
ticketed
and seated
just the same
.
How to Get to Independence
Start when it’s still dark, so you’ll miss the desert heat.
Follow the freeway
where it swoops inland. If you want, you can stop
in San Bernardino,
like I did for far too long. But don’t stop.
Escape over Cajon Pass past Vásquez Rocks,
a stony deck of cards shattered into a clutter of angles.
Make the crest at Cajon Summit,
where you’ll think the road is clear ahead. It won’t be.
Past Adelanto, you’ll see a speck of yellow
like a Mexican tin lantern, lonely across the land
An old man is awake, watching
the river of headlights, the stream in which he once swam,
only to wash ashore.
Atolia, Red Mountain. Randsburg, where tattered houses sag
like ghosts of lives fallen short.
China Lake, Inyokern. Pearsonville’s piles of auto parts
hoping for a second life.
Dunmovin, Olancha. Lone Pine, where you can see Mt Whitney,
highest peak in the lower states.
Continue past the sad remains of Manzanar, the prison camp.
You’re headed for Independence.
You’ll know it when you get there.
.
Ruth Bavetta’s poems have appeared in North American Review, Nimrod, Rattle, Slant, American Journal of Poetry, Atlanta Review, Tar River Poetry, and many other journals and anthologies. She likes the light on November afternoons, the music of Stravinsky, the smell of the ocean. She hates pretense, fundamentalism and sauerkraut.
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Stone Poetry Quarterly 