It’s raining in Colorado, just outside Denver. We’re driving,
and then the truck in front of us hits a highway pool,
and our windows turn a smeary gray-silver. Somewhere out there
it’s three lanes of traffic and a cliff edge. It only lasts
a couple seconds, which, it turns out, is a really long time.
I’ve tried a lot of ways to answer the question of existing
and I’m continually unsatisfied. I talked about it with Roger once,
or maybe it was Tim. And now Roger’s dead in Portland
and Tim’s in Albuquerque, which I can spell no problem
because Neil Young has a song called “Albuquerque”
that I’ve been listening to for over forty years,
and it was playing once in a house on Long Island
where I had a harmonica and played along, and I could hear
someone say, “Nah, he’s OK. He’s just into it.”
It’s summer, the sun on one side of the house then the other.
Sunscreen has always smelled like sunscreen. When I spray it,
it’s all the summers I’ve ever known, which is limited experience,
yes, but so is yours. I’d read Proust, but it’s too long.
So I spray sunscreen instead. A house blew up in our town
a few years ago. It was a low, physical thump. The windows
shook. I think it was the hot water heater. I forget. I think
this should be something we talk about more often
than the never I think I’ve talked about it with anyone.
We go home like 27 Evel Knievels, without music or plan.
Like how I could walk around in socks and call everywhere
indoors. A couch tumbling across someone’s yard.
Doors and clocks falling from the sky. I tried
looking it up, but it turns out houses explode all the time.
and then the truck in front of us hits a highway pool,
and our windows turn a smeary gray-silver. Somewhere out there
it’s three lanes of traffic and a cliff edge. It only lasts
a couple seconds, which, it turns out, is a really long time.
I’ve tried a lot of ways to answer the question of existing
and I’m continually unsatisfied. I talked about it with Roger once,
or maybe it was Tim. And now Roger’s dead in Portland
and Tim’s in Albuquerque, which I can spell no problem
because Neil Young has a song called “Albuquerque”
that I’ve been listening to for over forty years,
and it was playing once in a house on Long Island
where I had a harmonica and played along, and I could hear
someone say, “Nah, he’s OK. He’s just into it.”
It’s summer, the sun on one side of the house then the other.
Sunscreen has always smelled like sunscreen. When I spray it,
it’s all the summers I’ve ever known, which is limited experience,
yes, but so is yours. I’d read Proust, but it’s too long.
So I spray sunscreen instead. A house blew up in our town
a few years ago. It was a low, physical thump. The windows
shook. I think it was the hot water heater. I forget. I think
this should be something we talk about more often
than the never I think I’ve talked about it with anyone.
We go home like 27 Evel Knievels, without music or plan.
Like how I could walk around in socks and call everywhere
indoors. A couch tumbling across someone’s yard.
Doors and clocks falling from the sky. I tried
looking it up, but it turns out houses explode all the time.
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John Gallaher's most recent collection is My Life in Brutalist Architecture (Four Way Books, 2024). Gallaher lives in northwest Missouri and co-edits the Laurel Review.
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