Confessional Box for Those a Tad Off Plumb

by Carol Hamilton

Perhaps I heard 9:50 for 9:15.
We missed the express bus
to Kansas City, had to take a local,
all night, stops at every little Kansas
town. We stepped down
the narrow passage between seats
in darkness, settled into cushions
of grumpiness with nothing outside
to distract except shuffle-footed employees
bowing down to the gaped-open metal
mouth below our window.
So when the shadowy wraith entered,
stopped beside his elbow,
he quickly stood to lift her case
above our heads. “You’re a preacher,
aren’t you?” came the Cassandran
pronouncement from the shadows.
“I can always tell.”
Theology student might not
have lived up to her expectation,
but he was spooked.
Greyhound nights hold many voices
… a time for secrets … a place
for the slightly or wildly tetched.
The humming bullets slips
through prairie nights,
like Charon’s boat full
of truths hovering
somewhere between heaven and earth.

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I have recent and upcoming publications in Cold Mountain Review, Common Ground, Gingerbread House, Main Street Rag. Sacred Cow. U.S.1 Worksheet, Pontiac Review, Louisiana Literature, Abbey, 805, Poem, Third Wednesday, One Trick Pony, Plainsongs, O.V.S. Magazine, The Aurorean, The 3228 Review, Illya’s Honey,and others. I have published 17 books: children’s novels, legends and poetry, most recently, SUCH DEATHS from Vac Press Purple Flag Series. I am a former Poet Laureate of Oklahoma and have been nominated seven times for a Pushcart Prize.