This Redhead Of My Sudden Acquaintance Poem by George Wallace

hmmm, well, what i mean to say, the road
was straighter than this, and i was driving
unreasonably fast, a 57 chrysler imperial boy,
you remember those, no of course you don't
but oh man, well you know or maybe you don't,
cherry red souped up electric windows electric top
chrome grill big damn fins - but no brakes, no brakes
and you have to scuffle your feet along, take you
three miles to roll, if you want to stop, rocks flying
everywhere and you might need a new pair of shoes,
anyhow I couldn't afford tires, as my situation
concisely speaking was dire if not to say extreme,
but being that it was, i could of course have gone
around the corner, that is to say steal something
second hand, but at the time i was with this redhead
of my sudden acquaintance, well positioned in town,
she with a well oiled boyfriend and me with plenty of
time on my hands but no, he was not in tow on that
particular morning, in fact she had been sitting in a booth
at the diner a very long time by the appearance of things,
coffee cups ashtray full of nervous cigarettes, she was putting
hair pins into and out of her hair, well i struck up a conversation
and it got to be this and it got to be that, everything was going
along pretty damn fine and when i looked outside as sure
as we are sitting here today it had stopped raining, morning
was nearly over, the cat was out of the bag, so zippety doo!
we was off, both of us shot out of the barrel and that was that,
no doubt we was traveling ten times faster than what is legal,
i'm talking 35 plus 35plus 35, and then some, and it was
yes man! i mean no not that road outside fort collins i prefer
at this late stage to say it was one of them back east, headed
for her hometown, in kansas, she was a schoolteacher of good repute you might say, not a cop car to be seen, the breeze was
everything, eastern colorado was a sight to see, she was smart
and with that orange sky, no not like the red in her hair, a coppery
sort of red like lincoln's pipe on a new shiny penny, and she gave me
the prettiest smile just then, boy you could just feel it, that car
wanted to fly, we rolled down the windows and beat to the beat
on the dash -

oh my, she said, oh my! my right toenail, oh my, i do believe it has just had an emotion!