GYM CONFESSIONS: 2

two poems
I. miles per hour
my father and i are
heavy footed pedal
goblins. i inherited
his delicious
need for speed.

my father is an old friend
of I-95. spent years
mowing that pavement
down, crooning
Johnny Cash, John Prine.

my father listens
and understands
and he taught me
how to drive in his
beat-up white Dodge.

my father bought
his mother’s blue civic,
gifted it to me. now i cruise
brutally down I-95, screaming
Radiohead, Neutral Milk Hotel.

my father, my friend,
my father is my friend.
i could go 10 on I-95
or push 80 on a backroad;
my father’d understand.

II. driving into providence as fruit salad
blueberry overpasses
like a cartoon network
journey.

late banana
blinker, you cut me
off, masshole!

radioactive
cherry stoplights burn
my twitchy left eye.

lime zest directions scream
WARWICK, 1 MILE
fresh, real fresh.

clementine Tesla
peeling along the
on ramp: citrus ‘god.’

gala apple clenched between
a student’s teeth, electric
bike puttering over a crosswalk.