If I think to how many times I’ve sold
you the benefits of my company, I feel
sorry that you didn’t bring experience
of used car shopping to our love
affair. I must have carefully sold
all 200,000 miles as character,
not wear. I must have said look
at the speedometer. We can hit
120 and cruise across country.
We can crawl through the dust
bowl if you want, but let’s
crack a window because the air
conditioner busted a few years ago.
When I think to all the times we broke
down and I convinced you to sink
money into mechanic after mechanic,
I feel sorry we never made it
across country—air conditioner
busted or not—speedometer
reading fast or slow—sunroof
opened up to constellations.
And had we made it, Libra
could have taught us something
of balance and brokerage; the water
bearer might have cooled us—quenched
us in the desert, sending monsoon season
to pelt the outstretched arms
of saguaros, of our tongues.

———-
Kayla Rae Candrilli received a Bachelors and Masters in Creative Writing from Penn State University and is a current MFA candidate at the University of Alabama. Candrilli was awarded first place in Vela Magazine’s non-fiction contest for women, and is published or forthcoming in The Chattahoochee Review, Puerto del Sol, CutBank, The Boiler, Pacifica Literary, among others.

Photography by Laura Kiselevach.