Monday, March 05, 2012

I'M NEVER GOING BACK to TITTY MOUNTAIN

It was 963 miles from Tijuana
to Fort Stockton, and each mile
was hungrier than the last.   Amber
said to the passenger window 
(and out into the blurred liquid
desert) "We should slow down,"
she said languidly "maybe we
should stop." Oddly-elbowed
cacti shot by, and disappeared
into the Infinite Behind Us. 

The car grew hungrier, and so
did Amber, and so did I, but I
wouldn't admit it (of course.)
Texas was beckoning, and 
I was reckoning a short distance
to the fine fare of Fort Stockton. 

But the sun fell, and a polar moon 
rose over the High Plains, and
I couldn't tell if the shining in her eyes
was tears or twinkles, but
her face was a rich lady's bracelet
with the dark desert behind her. 

Neither of us was surprised
to find Fort Stockton's fine dines
closed to our midnight kind,
and I watched while Amber tried
to hide her hungry anger. 

But at (what seemed to us)
the Last Truck Stop on Earth,
Amber's eyes were shining again
when the waitress told her of 
the infamous titty mountain. 
Their laughter put my Pacific
Reckoning far behind me.

Amber's chirp of joy 
as she looked back West
on our way out of town
brought me home again;
she saw the low rise 
with its tiny craggy pike
bathed in the early light. 

And I agreed when she told me 
as we nosed our way home:
"I'm never going back
to Titty Mountain."