I flush the ticket down the bus toilet.
Plastic. Piss­glistened and disinfected.

Below me the pavement surges ahead,
hurtling me northbound along the flat
back of the Mississippi Delta.

There’s a xanax stuffed in my front pocket—
and in the back, a fist­clutch of New Testament pages
ripped from a Gideon’s Bible.

I’ve come to leave. I’ve come to wrap my arms
around something new and squeeze it empty
like I have everything else. My wife. My second

wife. The savings account. I’d ruin every last person
and crying child on this godforsaken bus if given
the chance. If given the time to endear them to me.

I once slept with a woman whose parents lived
off one of these gravel detours. I once slept
with a woman who didn’t know her own name.

I once slept with a woman who couldn’t
point to Memphis on a map
even at gunpoint.