Celebrating 15 Years
By JOHN MURILLO
Whitewalls Mudflaps
Late night howling down
a dark dirt road Headlights
killed and so the world gone
black but for the two blunts
lit illuminating Jojo’s fake gold
grin One girl each screaming
from the backseat we raced
the red moon rawdogged
the stars His mama’s car
my daddy’s gun Public Enemy
Number One Seventeen and
simple we wannabe hard-
rocks threw rudeboy fingers
and gang signs at the sky
Blinded by the hot smoke
rising like the sirens
in the subwoofers blinded
by the crotchfunk rising
from all our eager selves We
mashed in perfect murk a city
block’s length at least
toward God toward God
knows what when or why
neither Jojo nor I not our
two dates screaming had a clue
or even care what the dark
ahead held Come road
come night come blackness
and the cold Come havoc
come mayhem Come down
God and see us Come
bloodshot moon running
alongside the ride as if
to warn us away from as if
to run us straight into some
jagged tooth and jackal throated
roadside ditch When Jojo
gunned the gas we pushed into
that night like a nest of sleeping
jaybirds shaken loose and
plunging Between our screams
a hush so heavy we could
almost hear what was waiting
in the dark
John Murillo is an Afro-Chicano poet, professor, and playwright. He is the author of the poetry collections Up Jump the Boogie (2010) and Kontemporary Amerikan Poetry, forthcoming from Four Way Books. He teaches at Wesleyan University.
