It was Kansas where I saw
that accident, from the other
lane, as I whipped into the red
hugeness of a dying sun,
the bloodied prairie rivose
as an opened brain.
The dry shoulder was excelsior
where they had laid him, victim,
host, a glanced white scrap are you
washed, oh jesus! to the corners
of his universe. And then ahead,
like a window through sun-
gutted flats, to the center
of some truth that was jammed
into the space of a microscope
slide, his monochrome other,
his tendriled, secret life
had scored the white horizon.
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