Line in the Sand

Ken McCullough

What he said was vast, given his limits.

At some mojave of the soul, we stopped

to gas up, and I was inclined to bolt—

wrong look, wrong answer, might raise his demons（恶魔）,

but what did I know, who was I to say?

He tuned Tom Harmon on the radio,

sneered（嘲笑） and nodded like a slow woodpecker（啄木鸟）—

"Would that they had broke the mold," he chuckled

with sand in his pipes. The sun had stumbled.

His eyes turned on me—"What'll it be, rook?

Only one of us will walk away, son."

He coughed, spat. ''Are you in or are you out?

If you think you are fast enough, just once,

you might have a blind salamander（火蜥蜴）'s chance."