Issue
#2

March
2009 

a poem by Nathan Tyree

triptych

I am not embarrassed by the scars that line my face
like a badly folded map that has been tossed, ignored
on the floorboard, forgotten in the heaps of cigarette ash
and crumpled foil strewn over dead hours as the truck
traces its way past boarded shops and burned out houses

Her memory, my pain and the white line form an ancient
triptych of need hot desire pulled like sweet agony and
sweat from the taut flesh of the quivering highway at dusk
their broken blades laid out like shards of bone thrown
on the red earth as dark spreads over the horizon

The passenger seat carries a bottle, which needs no
protection from the belt or air-bag and never fucks
with the radio or complains about the air conditioning
or asks the difficult question about our
destination. We’ll get there soon enough

© Nathan Tyree

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