I’d driven fifteen hours, things broken back there

or refusing to break—not the things with which I’d stocked

the converted carport where I fried rice & cooked coffee, 

no—things: Love, Work, Money, Innocence (that stubborn 

fucker most of all). I was home again, nowhere to stay, 

mother dead, father somewhere, brother north, sister deep 

in the land of milk & screaming, friends put out of reach 

or gone or dead. Across from the dark bungalow 

whose every grease spot emitted moan, hum, or whisper 

I could sing any time you asked, I carried a dime 

into the phone booth outside the Hess station & called someone 

I had no right calling anymore. I was filthy, cold & hungry. 

I had enough money to turn around & enough will to bed down 

in the back seat, but the only word I knew was “Please.” 

Sometimes, tenderness sleeps at the heart of things. “Sure,” 
she said. “Take the couch. You can’t make me the asshole.”