• For years I've carved this track,
• honed a deep groove in the clay with my feet.
• I've been at it all night at least,

• carrying this sweaty man on my shoulders.
• He whispers fables as he clings
• to my head, sings eerie melodies

• as payment for his transport:
• laments for bills folded inside books of poetry,
• chicken soup neglected in the pot,

• final exam, today, for a class I never attended,
• 15 years ago, at a University I don't recognize.
• A skewed haiku hammers my anvils:

• Birthday of a friend
• passed while leaves turned, dropped, and still
• I forgot. She didn't.

• I cringe as he croons
• a tune of dented fenders and the dead
• mole flattened in the driveway. I stop walking

• and promise the man breakfast,
• vow to get my taxes in order,
• order flowers for my mother,

• return the library books growing moldy
• in a bag of gym clothes I need to wash,
• if I could just put him down–

• but all I hear now is the sound of crows.

Ronda Broatch