A Shrine for Bobby Allison

He gnaws a Slim Jim
dipped in Sweet Baby Ray's
and sips a green drink
on a palette outside the garage.
The Ford place
hired him
for his uncanny knack
with transmissions
and his steady supply
of fast gak.
His nails are blacker
than his lungs,
though the light bulb
and a Marlboro miles blowtorch
will soon remedy that.

He drives far too fast for the civilized
with his red plastic
volunteer fire light
perched atop his dusty capstan.
Everything he owns is filthy,
greasy,
and rotten,
from tube socks
to Mopar.

He mouths GOP talking points
though he doesn't know why.
He'd vote for Ron Paul
cause he's white
and a loner
just like him if it weren't
for those felonies.
They won't take his Glock
or his honor
BY GOD!
Confederate memorabilia and Pabst pull
tabs
festoon
his shrine to Bobby
Allison.

A single wide
(he's planning an addition)
with unhinged screens
on a red dirt plot.
Appalachian cliché,
vagabond secessionist,
trash in a hollar,
at least on the
outside.

What he won't tell you
is that he's scared
nearly all the time.
As a child he was the sensitive sort,
bullied and cajoled,
lambasted as a Mama's boy.
Seven years old,
playing easy bake oven
in his sister's Easter gown.

He weeps in the night,
his body a waste
from drugs
and heavy labor.
Speed to work longer,
and Valium to slow down.
Percocet for his pains,
and DEA
in the kudzu.

He dreams one day of giving it all away
disappearing into the ether
like a haint.
Over the Tennessee mountains
and into the night
four barrels
blazing a trail for
California.
He wants to go West
where the pot grows like lemons
in Florida
but Florida is too fucking hot
and free love waits
stoned
on a Norcal commune.
He read about it in High
Times
on the shitter
at the Ford place
smoking a Pall Mall
and snorting a quick one.

San Francisco?

Au Naturale
was the name of the article
and it featured
a pretty young thing
with pot leaves
on her tits.
Maybe he will and maybe
he won't.

Maybe he'll just stick around
till the DEA come out of the kudzu
and find his lab
in the shed out back,
and he'll empty a clip or go to prison
and play easy bake oven
with Buster
or Bubba?
Or maybe he'll give his
heart
to Jesus, get saved,
go to heaven
get up and out
of the gak world,
and quit thinking those thoughts
bout the boys at work.
He gets so tired of playing
uncle
and chicken
anyway,
bantering violence with
boys
and lot guards.

Who knows, but one thing's
for certain
it's all going to hell
inside
where the light was
the light that once shined
way back in his memory
when he didn't know
being a man meant something other
than being
himself.