Stopped by a Light Poem by Elaine Equi

There are far
too many of us
to pursue across

galaxies receding
in rearview mirrors.

Cars drowned
in pools of darkness,

leaving the mind's
engine to idle.

Across the narrow
divide of a thin line,
scenes crystallize,

splinter personalities
flare up into being -

a couple fuming,

a bored child
swiping a screen,

that woman, frozen,
with perfect spit-curls
and vermillion lips,

her cigarette dangling
just so.