MATTHEW HENRIKSEN


                                     



FORTY-YEAR-OLD FATHER ON A BIKE




Why wasn't I nailed down to the road
Robert Johnson never forgave nobody

He stole from his momma
fierce conviction delivered wrong

When the lightning went out of my eyes
nothing was said

The blacktop flowed into my baby's nostrils
I could have flipped the switch
in the bedroom of a stranger's house

A snakebite in the face
signifies nothing but the blind
tonguing of scrap tossed
in the back of a rusty truck
driven to the lake where she
was conceived and lit afire

as a mind stands blinking
where I stand at the stoplight
waiting for the stoplight to turn
the blacktop into something
clearer than electricity

I have it in my bones
which belong to the abscess
I wait in        waiting downward
where I stand as if the blacktop
where made-up air
I can't breathe
I can't even pedal
I'm flying now
along the powerlines
made of something burned
but belonging finally
to the locale of this
destination

Is it the air moving down or the ground moving up
or my body simply staying put
bleeding time out my ears
that gives the sky a voice to empty its mirror out into






TYPO 34