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Jacob Lindberg: “Midwest Exodus”

May 29, 2019 by PBQ Leave a Comment

Big gulps will turn tumbleweed
after race time, drag-cars will hiss
through this town like locusts.
But for now, they erect the Head
of the Lakes Fair, where by the end
of the week one girl takes off
with a fry cook missing two molars,
who traded his trailer for an RV
he’s rigged with a grease tub
and baskets. When the cops find out
she’s underage, there’s a statewide
search, her parents telling Channel 6
she’s a real good girl. And when the cops
find her sitting alone at a rest stop,
she’s pressing the bruises on her arm
to keep them warm. When they ask
if she wants to press charges she says,
They ain’t those kind of bruises.

Filed Under: Issue 99, Poetry 99

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