heaven drive-in movie theater 

i didn't mean to be fickle.
the angels come to burrow
in the fresh dirt. seasons come
like worms. i walk the miles needed
to find the drive-in where a movie
of flowers blooming plays
forward & back. i was told by
a dead deer on the side of the road
that i was dead too. i did not
take her word for it. she was 
too crooked to tell what my feet
were walking on. broken mornings 
bleeding yolk on the kitchen floor.
the screen is a bowl of figs.
no cars by mine in the audience.
i check the backseat for strangers.
listen & hope for no videos of myself.
all around the forest animals 
watch too. they ask each other
if we get to share the same 
afterlife or if we all go into
our thousands & thousand of caves.
lighting a candle just to see
the dreamscape. the manna glistening
on plates of gold. all for me.
we all want to believe we will
be rewarded or at least compensated.
the angels make shadow puppets 
& laugh at the ways morals
roll their hope down every mountain
they can find. i get out of the car
& walk towards the screen
as a film of my brother & i 
by the ocean spills so vividly 
from the screen that i can feel splashes
of salt water. then, the film cuts.
just my empty bathroom. a centipede
meandering across the floor. 
my shadow cast on the screen.
i close my eyes & open my hands 
as if they might fill with caramel.
the dead deer stands up 
& scatters into the deeper woods
where there are entrances 
to the otherworld everywhere.
still, we all have the act of passage.
release. i am not dead but i do
have conversation with them.
turn on my car before the credits.
more & more vehicles filling the lot.
no where to turn around.
shadows inside, eager to see 
what the projector has to say.
abandoning the old car 
just to walk home along 
the winding forest roads. 
in bed that night, the projector finds me.
puts a movie on the ceiling
as i try to sleep. i tell myself,
"i am alive. i am alive."