Sort of Easy to Die

In the day to day, it seems harder
but out here, on the endless highway
that no one has plowed

miles still from home,
it seems sort of easy to die.

I watch the speedometer and then the cars
in the other lane slide into the guardrail.
I think about speed.

Just hours before we had been up in New Hampshire
for the holidays but one by one we all left.
We were last. Your brother kept talking out loud about the storm.

Now in this small space we are talking softly,
about water, which we didn’t have
and speed, we struggled to control
and snowdrifts that refused to move.
I tell you that we’ll be okay as long as there are no hills.

and I’m thinking this blizzard might be real after all.

When we get home, I will thank you for not killing us,
and we will laugh,
exhausted on the couch,
our hands still trembling from the clutching,
our hair still beaded with sweat,
the car outside an umoving thing,
rocking against the wind and snow that barrels up the street,
demanding to be heard.