Five Hundred Poem by Robert Rorabeck

When Dale Earnhardt died,
I fell in love with NASCAR.
Delivering pizzas at the time,
I understood the dangers of the
Sport: when I saw her jogging, it
Was very hard to control the car.
When in the wee hours after
Saint Patrick’s Day a drunken
Sorority sister invited me into
Her portico to exchange my
Pizzas for sex with her, I accepted;
And inside her boudoir flecked
With Johnny Depp and Backstreet
Boys posters, her drunken legs
Open
Like a starting line,
I fell in love with the inevitable
Speed of life, and the little death
Inside women, inhaled like
The moment of breathing,
Involuntary, like an erection
And inescapable ruin of the
Body.
Running along her backstretch that night,
I understood what it took to be stock car driver,
Applying rubber feverishly under her panties,
Under the night the world circulating in
A giant socializing oval that sometimes led
The victory lane of sex.