You’re the lit cigarette on the railway
thrown from a train car in the Wild West
that will not spread fire over the map
to a theme song no one gets out of their head;
there is no chart for where we are
and the rivers are crossed but once,
and this one time I might just pick up the trail
and follow it to the edge, where the rails
meet the ocean. Either that, or I’ll leave
a brand-new poem beside yours
and see if it bothers to catch flame.

By Heidi Turner