By David Luntz
Route 1’s a twisting labyrinth of fast-food franchises, tattoo parlors, strip clubs, and fortune teller booths. It’s got no exit or entrance, beginning or end. I tossed my bread crumbs away. Deadweight. I pray I’ll run into the Minotaur.
Traffic lights bristle all around, a canopy of thorns. Sharkskin sky looms overhead, sharp enough to cut. Below the traffic light, a homeless man’s drowning in an invisible sea, clutching a sign that says, ‘He Has Risen.’ Out front, a rainbow blossoms in an oil slick. Weeds poke through the cracks in the asphalt. Faded like an old dog’s coat, they tremble in the breeze. I admire their resilience.
Across from the man, on an abandoned lot, several teenagers shoot hoops. They waver on the abyss of adulthood. I can tell from the way they move their dreams are still intact. Their hands don’t know what it’s like to struggle in open water. It would be easy enough to walk over and join them. But the gulf of compromises makes this impossible. Besides, their innocence would bore me.
David Luntz – Work is forthcoming in or has appeared in Post Road, Hobart Pulp, Farewell Transmission, Bruiser, ergot., X-R-A-Y Lit, Maudlin House, HAD and other print and online journals. More at davidluntz.com Twitter: @luntz_david