Tire Iron

A Mexican kid

was spinning a tire iron

in the front yard

across the street

(dirty white tank top you’re a floating ghost in oil)

his girl was looking on

but way past him

into the air

where the silence was growing more silent

sucked through a hole in the moment

her lips puckered sour

she sighed

waiting for the tire to turn

and her fate to

change.

The Mexican kid

was slowly trying

to change that tire

his brown muscles straining against the sun

his mind and body in no urgent rush

knowing that

as long as the car

wouldn’t run

she couldn’t go

anywhere.

I saw him stop

sniff the air

his nose puckered sour

she waved her hands

as if to get something

away from her eyes

as if to gesture, "I'm in Distress"

two tan faces looking up into

the empty sun

and I too

smelled smoke in the air

my soul was shriveled and stale

a victim of the same

sun God’s cruel joke  

smoke and smog, smoke and smog

a wild fire raged

not to far off

somewhere in the golden state

of California

angry flames eating trees

in the key of Eb minor

raging in blissful discord

madder than a masturbator with no hands

hotter than a sun burn on the back of the Devil.

I continued to walk

to my car

parked precariously

in my parent’s front yard

watching the action

from across the street

Mexican kid with a tire iron

Mexican girl waiting for a ride

I fished for my keys

in my pant pocket

thought for a second

(scorpions and unicorns dancing in a mirror)

(time like a deflated breast implant)

the Mexican kid’s woman

wasn’t bad

not good

but not so bad

if you were getting down to it

but I wasn’t, at that moment

thinking about

getting down to it

so I shook the thought from my skull

opened the car door

inhaled the sweet aroma

of a California burning

put it in gear

and drove on out of there.