The yellow cab driver looked back
when I said, I’m going
to get my ID and credit card,
then I want you to drive
me home. Those quiet hands
turned the wheel toward me
as my friend’s lip curled
and left the dark blood
on my chest. Halloween broke
into all souls’. One hand on the wheel,
one rubbing his face, the driver
moved all the pieces of me
away from that curled lip,
those teeth with my blood.
His feet slowed the wheels
at every house I puzzled over.
Not this one or that one,
but on this street of light-up ghosts.
I couldn’t offer the truth: I’d only had
one drink the whole night.
He nodded as I opened
the car door. I’m going
to come back, and then I want you
to take me home. The driver
waited as I found my body
on the boards of someone’s deck
and my ID with the host who asked if
I was okay and where my friend I won’t name
was as I left to find the driver
waiting for my body to return
just as my ID returned
just as my credit card returned.
The whites of his eyes steadied
a road behind me as he drove me
to a home I couldn’t lock the cold
out of. But for a while I was warm.
