lxxxxvii.

break the road across the mountains,
tear it across the washes and the slopes will
fall, always, slowly into gravel, spinning
in the wheels, and clattering to the shoulder,

shadows fall and hold in the crease where
the land rises, and in the dry stream-beds,
flow quiet along the asphalt, the hazy lights

at a cross-walk, by the cluster of houses, in the
chill, fog on the headlights burning
sharp across the divide, blinding the dark
close ahead, sundering the road from
the night--but the black roll rising

ahead of them, the deep blue above them
promises the road continues long past
them, threads dark and unceasing, clear
carries long beyond them