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."