February 25, 1974 (I was 29)
Buying gas in Pleasanton
In the gas line
45th in line
parked illegally
on the highway
trucks blow past
indignation
An improbable farmer on a
tractor
in an improbable field
grows smaller then larger
his slow tractor turns the
long rows of dirt
The station man walks up
the line with his NO GAS sign
An executioner
Who will be cut?
He walks past
Gulls waver in waves above
the tractor
then drop into the broken
swells
Fume tainted haze is the
new morning mist
Line of car starter
firing like salutes
Policeman over a megaphone
from his car
tries to clear a lane
The sun lifts the morning
sky
The station man shuffles
two lines into one
as diplomatically as
Kissinger
then sprints smiling
to the ringing phone in his
service island home
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