Driving from Romulus to Remus

I knew you best when you slept. The scar
on your face seemed deeper then. She called it your mark
of greatness, but we both knew it was the fault of the doctor.

It’s a tilted shot up the hand. Like the arcs from downed wires.
One hundred seventy miles from one arm to the other.
I drive past Castor Rd, past JFK Memorial Highway, and I’ve time
enough to wonder Pollux and Bobby are before the gas runs out.

November & it’s cold & I’m wearing your jacket. The blue one, with the insides
falling out. The burns from somebody’s cigarettes leave craters in the fabric.
I blow on my hands. The gas pump clicks.

& most days, I’m not sure how we made it. You can be Abel, I’ll be Cain.
Then we’ll switch. I do eighty, but the trip doesn’t go any faster.
If anything, it all slows down: raindrops are the hammers of glockenspiels
on the hood of my car—radio static melts, the dashboard clock blinks five at me

& we are idiot gods again, swilling beer, throwing rapture at parked
cars, waiting for the cornfields to catch fire. The train tracks
run over this viscosity of blood—knife deep. You light your cigarettes. I lick
the smoke and wait for the concrete to laugh.

& now I’m looking for Orion but I’m not sure if he’s out tonight. To me,
the stars come in packs, like wolves. But they’re bright & make me think
about colors & how I can never remember
if black is the absence of color or all of them combined.
You once told me gray was a cop-out, like beer
you can see through.

The dents on the hood of my car define their history for me, but I don’t care
because I’ve found Orion. Look for the belt, right?
The Hunter. What’s he after anyway? All that’s out
here is wheat and distance.

We’ll be Gemini. You sneak up on him, and I’ll take your place.
Then we’ll switch.