On a radio show some self-help guru says

the earth will burn out in a hundred years

so treat each day as an eternity.

I am in a taxi when I hear this news,

airport-bound on the flyover

with my home town spread like a map below.

So my driver slams his foot to the floor,

and tells me that when the oil runs out

he will ship this cab to Arizona,

find the last fill-up on the planet,

drain the pump and power out into the wilderness

until the car coughs, then abandon it.

He will take from the dash this shot of his daughters,

his shark’s tooth on its chain,

then leave the radio with an audience

of skulls and vultures. I wind the window down

to catch my breath and ask what kind

of funeral is that? Then him: It’s just a made-up one.





He drops me by the long-haul sign

and I give him a tip well over the odds.

As I stand with my bags it begins to rain.

A man smiles down from a floodlit billboard

– well insured, invested, sound –

which leaves me feeling heartsore, undefended.