I Ate The F-16

Spent one summer squaring grass,
sweated out a winter slapping meat
off dirty grills to twitchy customers,
then had Corey drive me to Midland County

Navy, “How much you want for that F-16
out back behind the gunships and copters?”
“$1 billion four.” “How about $800 cash
under your front porch mat, and we leave

it to shrinkage?” “Hell, it ain’t my store.”
THIS TEENAGE BOY GOT A FIGHTER JET.
Oh, man, one hand on a wet Pepsi can,
the stick tight between my knees,

and when Jimi’s done, I yank him out,
pop the Isley Brothers Greatest Hits
in a Kenwood 8-track built to military specs.
The cops are pissed. Nothing in the books

about supersonic rollovers overhead,
laws written for the gray and grounded.
My parents would only ask me once,
where I was, after I said, “30,000 feet.”

Children no longer have a language for me
but I can see it in their eyes: Yes! Fly!
And when I’m lonely, sad, teenage ugly,
I take her straight up inside a noonday sky

thinking the sun and I should maybe meet.
A newspaper route ends right quick,
fired hours after I carpet-bombed
my town with 500 pounds of blues.

The boss said I was sure spectacular,
but Sunday papers tore through roofs,
and I missed most of our subscribers,
so they have a company policy now

against kids capable of 500 mph.
For the big game one Friday, I offered
to strafe the enemy high school gym!
But, they said, “No, we always steal

their mascot; they paint our statue.
For 60 years, that’s how it’s done”
What shocked me most: girls scared
at the sight of an open jet cockpit,

as if faster-higher was better left idea,
than skinny, brown-haired kid,
all their beauty and power wasted
to make us one much like another.

A lonely boy lands a Falcon Jet,
amid Camaros, Firebirds, Mustangs,
and he’s only lonelier, sadder yet.
Sameness: the straight oxygen

of this community, the not wanting
enough. Greatness sure is exile.
But Judy took a ride. More than friends
or lovers, we flew proud as proof

of some other place–bravelands, maybe.
One night, I pulled her on my lap to drive.
“Keep both hands on the wheel.” Unbuttoned
her blouse, unhooked her bra, unzipped her pants.

“Let’s see you run her by the courthouse
with my hands on your tits.” So she did.
And the way she laughed just then
should be written in our history books,

though they never record much
of the epic fun people like us had.
(Judy calls it, “Doom Lit. 101”).
That’s the way it was. Me & my F-16

widening every sky, until the second year
of college, when I met Ellen, and chose
to settle down. We got married,
moved into a one-bedroom apartment,

made plans to raise a family–no jet
fighter need; things were moving fast;
my life couldn’t take one more shove.
But, I couldn’t leave my past to rust–

the energy, speed, fury to airless heights.
Maybe I could keep it all inside, decades
stored for some different kind of flight.
And so, come a starkly moonlit night,

I ate the F-16.
I ate the F-16.
I ate the F-16.
I ate the F-16.