Moon Aorta Moon Ditch Moon (X)

I hear the damp thud, the rustle of grass. 
Glass packed in skin like both arms barbed

in pure light, and I imagine that, the girl’s 
hum wound around a throat mired with soil.

Choir of car horn and crickets chirp an elegy 
I’ve revised from every wrecked angle, one side

messed with antifreeze, another folded delicate 
as onionskin, radiator and grill. Vomit distills

into smoke or something just as insubstantial. 
That girl’s body almost dismantled until father

coasts in—mere storm cloud, soul—the corpse 
of that Chevy scorched over. I dream he’s what

lifts the car husk off of her, that he watches 
her elbows ruck mud for escape. He says

nothing, just waits until she drags out of range 
before he sets the thing down. I hope he’s

the reason she’s found, that the bathrobed 
stranger sprints out because he somehow

rattled the door. The moon a stone overhead.
The ditch sticky wet. Perhaps he pressed

his thumb to her neck before evaporating 
to the mouth of this world. At the marrow,

I’ll never know. But I hope. God, I hope.

Read more from Issue 16.1.