Queen of the Gas Station: A Eulogy

Louisa always liked the firemen

Who burned the dim woods,

Who smoked out their truth.

And what remained took to a shadow,

Cast by their unholy light.

When they don’t burn our skin

“They keep us warm”

She laughs

Laughed

I wish it still echoed.

Louisa once told me

That she had a dream

That her hair was long again,

And she was a girl again,

Still sweet.

That we didn’t know our own cruelty,

And with her carmine lips she smiled.

She told me that those eyes didn’t belong to her (anymore)

But still,

They looked back.

Louisa and I sit by the gas station,

Sat

Miles away,

It looks the same as this one,

All emptiness looks the same.

We would sit on the hot concrete in our cheap skirts,

And pull at the weeds,

Satiating the need to kill

To control

That all we have,

The ground is hard here too,

But the neon’s far too bright,

But if she closes her eyes,

It should be alright

Louisa lived elsewhere

But I think she died here,

I can’t change that,

And the clouds are dark

And so it falls

I lift my eyes

To still look up,

Hope

Looking for a fabled arc

That Louisa would have loved

But it’s just sky

All above.