'The Graffiti Maze' by Robert Vaughan

I.

Some people sleep on trains. I can’t because I’m waiting for them to fall asleep so I can do my business. Furrow the back forty, my Daddy used to call it. A stand of pines can make you blunder. Or a rusted out lawnmower overturned on its side in the weeds.

2.

Surtevant stop- it’s the only thing that can never do me no harm. Jump off the train, silent, undercover, slip into the marsh. Be careful of cat-tails, they can cause severe damage. Eternal miasma. Find a place that will saddle you with fortune, helps to be armed in the dark, or loaded, or locked up like my Mommy still is.

3.

She isn’t my real Mom. No. My real Mom is Hiawatha. That’s what my Daddy calls her. Says you got her hair kid. Better off bald. You have to sleep above the ground. Snakes in the grasses. Find platforms or just sleep standing up like a horse. That way, when they come for you, run like the wind.

4.

Every restless night when I make a bed from cornstalks and sometimes sand or silt from the local grotto, I know I will rise. You could have left a light on. It’s just a power plant. Makes no difference what you say now. Here’s what the moons shows me: you’re still a liar.