cw: car accidents

At least once
a week, I brake in the red taillights of another
accident between sleep 
and work, suburb and downtown, island
and city in the steady monsoon of the Northwest,
and the millions of drips
and drops
and dented bumpers continue falling
again
and
again.

So I merge left and drift past
squad cars, mangled cars, lines of rubberneckers gawking,
straining, hoping for a broken windshield, the freshly dusty black
swerve of tire marks, the flash of the wrecker, a distant
siren or two in their prayer for the glimpse of something
singular
spectacular, a death, any death—“You’ll never guess what I 
saw today!”—maybe even their own.

---

Dave O'Leary is a writer and musician living in Seattle. He's had two novels published and has had prose and poetry featured in, among others, the Daily Drunk, Versification, and Reflex Fiction. His forthcoming book of poetry and prose--I Hear Your Music Playing Night and Day—will be published in May 2021 by Cajun Mutt Press.

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