A Writer in Iowa

I’ve been down a road
with wheat stacked on both sides,
so I thank God for the scattered hills
and the small town wedged between them.
Not that I don’t appreciate the country’s
flat and endless bread-basket,
but a slow rise does my concentration a favor,
and civilization grants my wish.
I can sit up at a diner counter
and order a stacked BLT,
as close as its gets to that sandwich’s
birthplace in the land I’ve just passed through.
And the Coke comes in a shapely bottle,
not some indifferent can,
and it bubbles like nostalgia does
when released into the present day.
Two farmers sit nearby, make small talk.
One’s in town to look at tractors.
The other’s waiting for the garage
to be done with his SOB truck
I listen in on the conversation,
revel in the authenticity.
Three of us are having lunch
but I’m the only one working.

John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in New World Writing, North Dakota Quarterly and Lost Pilots. Latest books, Between Two Fires, Covert and Memory Outside The Head are available through Amazon. Work upcoming in California Quarterly, Birmingham Arts Journal, La Presa and Shot Glass Journal.