Dirt road kind of love

The skin of our unshaven calves wear socks of dry earth.

The humming of distant metal birds and the whispers of an overgrown wild field.

These are the textures of our home brewed fascination

I could draw the blurring lines of your shoulders

Rounded with farmhand muscle

A thousand times and still drop my jaw in admiration

It’s the kind of love story they sing about in 2000’s country songs

But softer and held precious between our arms and our ribs

Plaid button up shifting against pick-up truck unbelted night rides

My face buried in your long hair, coarse from the sun-rain and the dry, dust-air

Soap and dirt and hay bale hair

Kisses like the revealing of soda cans (which we call pop)

And drunken howling at a full moon so close we could take a bite out of it

To see if it’s really made of Swiss or cheddar or something better

river-walkers brushing off tiny leeches that are too small to cause real harm

We say we’ll both go off to a college up north and to the east someday

Or maybe escape to California where the beach waves

But I’d be content to stay just where I am

I’d be content to live in your dreamer’s eyes

To ride into the sunset with you on the back of a Belgian horse with boots for hooves

I’d be content to drown with you

In the listless belly of the countryside where you can actually tell there are stars in the sky

I’d be content to knit sweaters with you when winter falls

If you wanted that

I’d put my muddy cowboy shoes with spurs I don’t really use

Atop the gas pedal of a vehicle that rumbles a dozen times before ignition

If you wanted to

We could drive eternal on this dirt road and let the miles teach us songs of old

We could wish to be lone rangers like the ones on

Dad’s cassette tapes and write our own versions where the wives are more than household bakers

And the duels are more than bullets

Where the love stories last years instead of minutes

And the bandits are imagined.