pilgrimaging
to Graceland
you missed
your off-ramp
so this one
will have
to do


you failed
to notice
sneaker fruit
adangle
in the wires
above
didn’t see
the board-ups
the burnouts
tagged and
slashed with
blue curlicues
red ziggedy-zags

they wanted
you car
they asked
you nice
they recycled
you in a
green garbage
cart.

———-
R. A. Allen’s poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in the New York Quarterly, The Recusant (UK), Pear Noir, Word Riot, Gargoyle, JAMA: Journal of the American Medical Association, and elsewhere. He lives in Memphis.