for the ride home

you sit in the bar
watching the cars drive by
through the window
thinking
how nice it'd be
to get sucked up
into the sky
or some such nonesnse

while the people two stools down
tell someone on the cell
how they're getting married
now that she's just out of jail

and all the while
there's the President
on TV

and the cooks
making soup

and the mud
you gotta walk through
just to get back
to the car
for the ride home

while the bartender
smokes outside
when everyone's all set up
for a minute or two

and cars race past
on their merry ways
as life
streams along
sober or not

in this world
of emptiness