Lane Devers

Lua

I gathered all the evidence I exist
and brought it to the DMV. You exist!
They said, and then revoked my driving
privileges. I blew it off, went to a museum
and stood in front of a crystal as tall as me,
thinking of the wind or the river, that gutted
it into its shape, whistling through caves
somewhere in Idaho, or the badlands
of North Dakota. I was only okay
at skeet shooting the one time I went
in Oregon. I kept asking everyone:
what are these little orange things,
and why do we want to kill them?
People laughed, but I’m sick
of myself, or sick of making jokes
to cut through the bitterness of winter.
I went to Coney Island and listened
to the screams from the roller coaster
while I stared at the Atlantic.
I want to tell you about the time
I wrecked my car to my favorite
Mac Miller song, the sky was twinkling
yellow with smog, the same shade as the album
cover. Poems are a psychedelic thing,
they move in the shape of a river
or with the lyricism of a song,
it’s so embarrassing, but someone has got
to do it. Once I looked after a small grey dog
named after the saddest song I know.
Lua, I said. Lua only bite my enemies, please.
Tale as old as time: poet full of anger
like an overstuffed Piñata, beating
and beating at himself with a bat.
Remember when we drove to the beach
in the middle of the night because we needed
to remember the coast's thinning hairline, the trees
burned back at the scalp, and we almost hit a coyote
but missed it by a few feet. I turned on the speaker,
it wasn’t Mac Miller. Not yet. I don’t want to
get to the part where my blue car crumbles like a wave.