My Family Had a '55 Ford
Stephen Newton

My family had a '55 Ford when it was
new in those years we would drive
back from my grandmother's house

three or four hours on winding two
lane roads my brothers and I all
sleeping in the back one on the seat

two in each of the wheel-wells on
the floor just the right size for little
boys to curl up listening to the road

underneath feeling warmth through
the floor pillow on the hump in the
middle and no matter how far we

traveled all the roads we went down
on those nights the moon was still
in the same spot shining spokes of

light over the hills of New England
enigmatically gazing through the
dreaming windows following

our black Ford rolling through the
night parents in front sleeping boys
in the back this moonlit night travel

while beyond the hills the same
moonlight gazed its eye on cities on
oceans deserts the stars beyond but

still in the midst of it all there was
this black automobile these hills
and New England road this sleeping

family on a dark highway streaming behind
and underneath in this night filled with
trees and dark water running under the stars

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