Inventory

1. The train in the distance was a book I never
2. finished. I stopped at a gas station, and I was
3. gushing. All I had: a suitcase of lowcountry

1. brochures, an assorted inventory
2. of rods and reels, and a banana peel
3. from the week before, the smell so sweet

1. it almost killed me. You said: Absurd!
2. No rain falls like that! No one smells her
3. garbage in that manner! But I didn't pretend

1. that the ferry floated every bit of the time.
2. I referred you to the quilt, as it told the whole
3. story: a roomful of milk jugs, waist high;

1. a door on the screened-in porch, two
2. latches. Muted colors and a dust filter.
3. I was the teenage graffiti on the concrete

1. pilings. I was the rock hurled at the alligator
2. twelve feet below. You said: Absurd!
3. The memory card was full! There is no way

1. you saved a picture! Yet my point remained
2. sticky: a watermelon seed spat from a clock,
3. sweat on a gym teacher's clipboard.

1. I fought against the whistle, rejected the generic,
2. for the motel seemed appealing from the outside.
3. Besides: I needed a good cover for the night.