Eight rhymes with hate, rhymes
With fates of confusion. Nine
Rhymes with Time, which
makes you feel safe, even
though contusioned…

(I shouldn't be alive, right now, my daughter and I were almost killed by a foolhardy driver who couldn't wait the 300 feet or so he had to go to reach the up-mountain divided highway.

We were coming down out of the Black Hills, towards Morenci, coasting at 65 with cruise control on, since the Tahoe seems to have a tendency to 'cruise' 5 miles or more than is set. We were coming around a pair of tight curves, which led to the bridge over the Gila River, a no-passing zone of maybe 200 feet or so. There was an impasse of four or five semi's chugging up the hill past me around the curve, I noted each one with fast-moving rectitude, as I was braking, semis always get my attention, especially on curves.)

Here I am, tonight, thunder
Rumbling and roaring some miles
Away, besieging my fort,
As if I owed it my life. I do... Sigh.
Not because, but because not. I
Love thunder, but am not such a fool
As to think thunder loves me. It is not
An equitable entity to humanity’s skin,
this entity equitable. This Thunder.

(Never in a million years would I have thought someone would be so stupid as to try to pass FIVE semis, much less anything, in that tiny space, until I faced the (deleted expletive), head on!! Maybe fifty feet away. Oh my god... Kelly Clarkson was playing on the radio station; I remember that, I was just telling my daughter how I loved her voice. There was a drop-down cliff to my right, with no guard rail, and no shoulder, just a small bit of earth hugging the roadside, and, that's what I headed for, moving my vehicle to the right as he/she tried to move back to their right. Somehow, we passed, and I maneuvered back to the pavement, only to fishtail scarily back and forth, with two other vehicles coming towards me! ... I did it, though, I maintained control, I don't even know how. As soon as we were past the mortal danger, my arms and hands started shaking uncontrollably, I was gasping and half-crying, because, I was alive...)

By now, they still wouldn’t have cleared ‘the curve’ of most
Of the accident, probably the worst it’s ever seen. Two semis,
Two cars, and two SUV’s, scattered and smashed and flung
Down and upon cliffs of desert mountain hell, wasn’t.

How come? …

(I am not fond of the thought of vehicular death and maim-ability, I was in one accident I don't remember, in Colorado, where I fractured my pelvis in three places, and woke up in a hospital wondering who was making all these strange moaning noises, than realizing it was me.

I am pretty much a stickler for vehicle laws, signals and brake lights are the only awareness we have of what is going on in another drivers head, this wasn't that, but, damn it, I almost died because of an idiot's impatience with what been proven safety is about, highway-wise. I hate this kind of stupidity, and I wish whoever was driving that vehicle that almost hit us head-on has learned a lesson, and I hope one of the semi drivers reported this person, as I had no time to get a license plate number.

I know this is not a big story in the category of 'how I shouldn't be alive', compared to murders and wars and love and espionage and hatred, but it does have its roots in disrespect, the precursor of all of the above.)

I guess what keeps you and me alive
Is Us. Maybe I ‘m one, and, maybe I’m not,
At times, but, what I do know is
I’m not the other driver,
because, I care.

Erin Elizabeth Kelly-Moen
© Copyright 7/27/06