Wreck

POETRY

by Katherine Fallon

Every time she drove after dark she popped her trunk and sifted
through a box of light bulbs       shaking them to see if they were 
good or dead.                          Good she screwed into the gaping

wind-borne sockets                                of her shattered headlights.

Bad she put back so they’d be tested again                                         
                                          the next time and the next and the next.
 
                  Before                        there was an accident somewhere
between stop signs                                                       snow so thick
I couldn’t see her                once she left the car: just her red scarf

and then that too                                                                          
                          disappeared                                                       
                                               as she knelt at the grille.                 
Her naked beams were dying                                  pushing against

the blizzard’s billow.                             Later           she showed me:

she had gone into the mouth                   of the wreck in search of
                                         a breaking point. Her hands were sliced

like the gills of a netful of fish.                          I had stayed warm
                            stayed inside                                  had not helped.
Like I hadn’t even been there.