She says it’s for bus fare home. Not like crazy,

paint the town, but mad mad really mad,

hornets and hell and how could he

 

And the fog was so thick they had to stop

and sleep in the car. In the morning they

saw they’d been hanging over the edge of a

 

Says you tuck it in a shoe in case he takes

your purse, in case a hand goes over

your mouth as one goes up your

 

Says her aunt brought home these sailors

and they all played poker and her aunt

died a drunk but always liked a

 

And the car got a flat and he was in a cast

and he changed it with a broken

 

And somebody stole his shirt and his watch

but they went to Reno and got married

in a borrowed

 

Says even then you tuck it in a drawer

in case he

 
 
 
 

 

Amy Miller’s full-length poetry collection The Trouble with New England Girls won the Louis Award from Concrete Wolf Press. Her writing has appeared in Gulf Coast, Tinderbox, Willow Springs, and ZYZZYVA, and her most recent chapbook is I Am on a River and Cannot Answer (BOAAT Press). She lives in Oregon.