Oregon Trail

my first venture west was in Windows 98

or Independence, Missouri. class in the computer lab

& we were supposed to be playing some typing game

or another. the one i remember had a haunted theme.

ghosts instructing us on the finer points of where

to put our fingers. these were the last days

before keyboards as appendage, when typing

was not nature. i should’ve been letting an apparition

coach me through QWERTY but rather

i was at the general store deciding between ammo & axles,

considering the merits of being a banker or carpenter.

too young to know what profession

would get me to the Willamette Valley

in the space of a 40-minute period.

i aimed my rifle with the arrow keys, tapped the space

bar with a prayer for meat to haul back to the wagon.

this game came difficult as breathing underwater after

trying to ford a river.

                                        i was no good at survival.

somebody always fell ill or out into the river.

each new day scurvy or a raid was the fate of a character

named for my crush or my baby sister.

this loss i know, how to measure what it means

to die premature before a school period ends.

i can’t understand the game coming to a late end.

an elderly daughter grieving her elderly mother.

reading the expansive obit in a suburban

Detroit church is a confusing newness.

when the old do the thing the world expects

i retreat into my former self. focus on beating

video games I’ve always sucked at, brush up

on Chicago Bulls history, re-memorize

the Backstreet Boys catalog, push

away whatever woman is foolhardy enough

to be on any road with me. i pioneer my way away

from all the known world. i look at homicide rates

& wish we all expired the way i know best. i pray

for a senseless, poetic departure. i pray for my family

to not be around to miss me while i’m still here.

i want a short obituary, a life brief & unfulfilled,

the introductory melody before a beat’s crescendo into song,

the game over somewhere in the Great Plains.

i want to spare my descendants the confusion

of watching a flame flicker slow. keep them from being

at a funeral thumbing the faded family pictures like worn keys,

observing the journey done, the game won, the west

conquered.