Wallace, Idaho
Last night snow fell all over western
Montana. The hundred miles from Missoula
was a slog through ice, slush and more:
passing trucks rained filthy salt spray.
The windshield wipers’ flip-flap, flip-flap
beat time to Bette Midler’s coast-to-coast
serenade of Peggy Lee on satellite radio.
You asked if we might stop and browse
the antique shops of downtown Wallace.
Gingerly I left the highway, went under
the trestle and into the town, where
when I braked, we kept going. A terrified
adagio, mimicking time itself in this place,
slid us gradually to a slanted stop.
We read silently from a license plate,
379 CTO, “Famous Potatoes,”
here at the glassy center of the universe.
Montana. The hundred miles from Missoula
was a slog through ice, slush and more:
passing trucks rained filthy salt spray.
The windshield wipers’ flip-flap, flip-flap
beat time to Bette Midler’s coast-to-coast
serenade of Peggy Lee on satellite radio.
You asked if we might stop and browse
the antique shops of downtown Wallace.
Gingerly I left the highway, went under
the trestle and into the town, where
when I braked, we kept going. A terrified
adagio, mimicking time itself in this place,
slid us gradually to a slanted stop.
We read silently from a license plate,
379 CTO, “Famous Potatoes,”
here at the glassy center of the universe.
posted by Kelley Dupuis | 2:21 PM
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