Both the hitchhiker and I –
she might have been a Julia –
were trying to find something:
she, Utopia,
me, a Good and Honest Heart.
The born-again couple
who sold me the Packard
swore it would take me
at least as far as
the next Mardi Gras.
Julia and I drove it through
the green hills of the Ozarks
until the hoses blew and tires flattened.
We left it by the roadside,
radiator smoking.
She joined a commune
near Cape Girardeau.
I thumbed to Kansas City, found
its massive trees lit by November sun.
Blood was everywhere, even in the leaves.