The Trucker

Elevators, like great oaks
rise into the evening, and when they descend
you hardly know yourself.
All night
the fair, shadowed cab light
shone on the trucker's face. If only
he had learned to think like that!

Some extremes, but much benign lack of interest,
for which the heart gradually opens.
... patiently working, bringing cattle

from Denver, sorghum, oats,
butter, wheat and pigs from the Midwest,
steel bars, the body

with its different nightly smells ...
He wanted to walk the length of Kansas.
The years had not even been difficult,

but like the stars
he watched from the speeding cab,
spaced unevenly ...
so many particular events.