Avenue of the Saints
Anne Myles
—the name of the highway that runs from St. Louis, MO to St. Paul, MN
I take my seat between heaven and earth,
my hands on the wheel. Last streaks of light
color the sky-fields; clouds trail a lace
of rain to the west. On every side the world’s
the same and changing. Now September’s come,
corn as tall as it will get and turning dry
in rustling imminence, bean fields washed gold.
Black Angus browse calmly across a hillside;
one paces toward a stream in slow nobility.
How strange the word transport is—
meaning whatever carries you, be it ecstasy,
a car, a cattle truck. Just north of Cedar Rapids
a white sign looms: I STAND WITH TRUMP!
The owner paints it freshly every season.
Wheels bump on pavement seams; the vanishing
expanse of land is marked by tiny distant lights
and suddenly I’m recalling Etty Hillesum,
who threw her scribbled postcard from the train
that carried her to Auschwitz; some farmers
found and mailed it. How she was all aflame
with love and prayer. How her message flew
through air to grass: We left the camp singing.
Anne Myles’s poetry has appeared in the North American Review, Split Rock Review, Whale Road Review, Lavender Review, Early American Literature, and other journals. A recent transplant to Greensboro, NC, she is Professor Emerita of English at the University of Northern Iowa and in 2021 received her MFA from the Vermont College of Fine Arts.