by John Dorroh
Driving Lessons
We began simply, in parking lots
after hours: the fairgrounds
on a Wednesday in September,
gravel pinging the undercarriage;
the old Kmart with its front windows
boarded up. We would move
forward and then reverse, circle
the light poles, rehearse signaling
and gentle acceleration.
The accessory roads came next.
They offered straight trajectories
and practice with little to no
shoulder. If a hare darted out from
the Queen Anne’s lace, we spoke
of focus and how to avoid landing
in the ditch. Eventually, we took to
the town just east of: its stop signs
and few traffic lights, its slow pace.
We recalled the one to the right
of us goes first, that parallel parking
is a skill requiring a good eye
for distance. There was, then, the city
and its one-way streets, the afternoon
of rain when we navigated flooded
intersections. It wore us out: that day.
Got us thinking about walking
as the preferred mode of transportation.
Hoofin’ it, she’d say. I’m hoofin’ it
downtown. Catch you later. Later, we sped
on I-90, taking the on-ramp
and the off-ramp, learning to merge
with respect. We blared the radio
once, with every one of the windows
down, edging just over the limit.
One of the last times, we traveled
across the river to the falls
that have since collapsed. We got out
to stretch our legs, stood above
the water and studied other forms
move in ways we could, at best, only mimic.
Kelly R. Samuels is the author of two poetry collections—Oblivescence (Red Sweater Press) and All the Time in the World (Kelsay Books)—and four chapbooks: Talking to Alice (Whittle Micro-Press), To Marie Antoinette, from (Dancing Girl Press), Words Some of Us Rarely Use (Unsolicited Press), and Zeena/Zenobia Speaks (Finishing Line Press). She is a Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominee with work appearing in The Massachusetts Review, River Styx, Sixth Finch, Denver Quarterly, and RHINO. She lives in the Upper Midwest. Instagram: @kellyrsamuels .
John Dorroh travels whenever he can. He often ends up in people’s kitchens exchanging culinary secrets and tall tales. “Through food there is communion,” he says. Six of his poems were nominated for Best of the Net. Hundreds of others appeared in fine journals such as Kissing Dynamite, River Heron, Feral, Burningword, and North Dakota Quarterly. He once was awarded Editor’s Choice Award from a Midwest journal with a monetary prize large enough for two sushi dinners.