elegy for the man eaten by wolves on the new jersey turnpike

Content warning: Physical violence or abuse.

elegy for the man eaten by wolves on the new jersey turnpike

no use in goin’ after ‘em, Margaret,
they’ll just circle round you and yowl their grievances
same way they did me.
til your ears are wantin’ to bleed.
you can bring your sawn-off shotgun, Margaret
but the wolves don’t fear that thing, they don’t fear nobody,
certainly not me, certainly not God.

the wolves were after me when we fell in love, Margaret.
when you saw me playing the banjo in the hometown victory parade.
your sister said well now,
sure, he’s a handsome one, but he’s had that pack of wolves after him since he was born.

just you watch, when this next song is up, he’ll dive for the bushes
scratch his pretty face up with brambles and twigs
and spend a lifetime on the run.
another night means another hollow scream, another screech of tires on the pavement, more
cursin’ and hollerin’
the wolves done caught up with him again

and sure enough the wolves did come, and I did dive for the bushes.
and you dived after me, Margaret.
I told you a life with me would be a life spent in the backs of speeding pickup trucks, ducking
into storefronts and government offices and other such wolf-free areas, plunging through lakes
and rivers to throw them off our scent, negotiating alliances with the bears for protection.

there were ribbons in your hair, holding up those
black ringlets you shook with your laughter when you said that don’t matter none to me
and when I said the wolves are gonna kill me someday
someday soon Margaret
you said well then they’ll have to kill me too.
but before they can do that I’ll catch them and skin them alive
and wear an elegant gown and a cape and a crown all made from their ashen fur.

when the wolves got me, Margaret
you were sleeping
maybe they heard your grandstanding all those years ago and decided to wait until you finally let
your guard down enough to dream again

with your curls all splayed on the makeshift pillow.
your legs entangled in quilts, nesting like a mother hen
in the back of the pickup truck.

well, I was next to you, sleepless as always
my one eye forever peeking open
when finally, I saw them
gathered on the horizon
they spoke to me without words.
I had to go to them.

we had some good years, didn’t we, Margaret,
when you took me down to New Orleans
and we rowed out to those long secret tendrils of the swamp.
cicadas sang songs to me then, songs about you.
about your laugh and your mop of black hair.

I was always gonna die by the wolves, Margaret.
there’s no good reason I can think of why you should
feel an ounce of pain for a boy who was always dead.
you’ll find some other boy and he’ll treat you fine, my lovely Margaret.
why, you could

run yourself a bath tonight
fill a pipe with that tobacco you like,
forget all about your lover with the banjo.
forget the scents you’re tracking, the dried smears of canine blood on your cheeks, the spears
you’ve spent countless hours sharpening on the grindstone —

no, best to leave it be now,
you know how these things can get real heavy real fast
besides that, you’ll drive yourself mad
trying to find them when they don’t want to be found

and then someday, many years from now
you can come out to meet them on the turnpike, Margaret.
bring your muskets, bring your torches, bring the whole town.
I’ll see you in the woods after.

torn up and bleeding we’ll be,

bite marks buried deep in the meat of our thighs,
loose flaps of face hanging off our skulls.

we’ll make a three-legged creature,
two-headed and barely able to stand
but I’ll be laughing with you, my hands back in your bloody curls,

murmuring why,
I haven’t seen you in a dog’s age

About the Author
Michelle Moroses is a writer and poet from the Jersey Shore. Previously, she has worked at Ploughshares and The Emerson Review. Her previous work can be read in The Penn Review, The Bitchin’ Kitsch, Poets Reading the News, Anti-Heroin Chic Mag and Frontier Poetry.