INBETWEENLAND

There is no road out of this metaphor.
Map washed away back in the rainy
season, compass crushed
by a herd of elephants.
Tank dry as bleached bone,
the truck hasn’t started in five months,
four days, three hours. Treetops
spire high and bare
where giraffes have eaten
the best leaves.  Desire flops
and dies under the dusty sun,
a ghost moth with broken wings. So
here we are.  You, me,
a dead riverbed —
                            and
a herd of zebras, crowded
onto the last patch of grass,
black and white stripes
blazing in a toast-colored world.

Forget what I said.  Desire is the only fuel.