We Are Highway Nights, Part III

Heliocentricity, Phlegyas told us,

is the answer. It is the reason

we all end up crossing rivers

and thus is the answer. He lived

beneath the bridge over River Styx.

He told us, he said

that it was the safest place he could find.

We were not fooled.

 

Styx was a mirror, a giant crystalline iris

staring up unblinking at those passing over.

The water sliced like a knife, its stroma iridis

interlacing like snakes sharply on the surface.

Several thousand crossed over while Charon silently rowed

but left no ripples, a march militaire into a losing battle.

They are the children of Styx, said he, and so,

must return to their father with a perfect circle in hand

like a rosary.

 

Northward bound, deathly still, to Hitchhikers’ Land.

A expletus orbis, we are all ferrymen, each one

a criminal to his own cross.

 

We watched hand-in-hand for a time,

but bid farewell to Phlegyas and left him under the bridge.

She told me, she said as we watched Styx fade over the horizon,

she said that Styx is just the Nile,

and the Lethe is just the Amazon,

only with a disguise of glass, of

violet sunset glass.       

 

Author's Note

tell me what you think