Learner’s Permit by James Davis

Learner’s Permit

When I was learning to drive,
Dad and I shared the cabin
of a cream-colored pickup
with an NRA sticker on the rear windshield
and a lightly used mattress
tied down in the flatbed
winding along the Columbia River
to my runaway brother,
who slept in a bag
on Portland linoleum.
Dad’s turn at the wheel
left my eyes to the Gorge,
my ears to the charismatic
preacher on yet another tape.
He spoke of pleasure,
how the climaxing brain
exudes a mental superglue
that fuses beholder to beheld.
“Which explains why semen
and cement sound so similar,”
he reasoned. “If you come
to porn, you’ll fall in love with porn.
If you come looking at a man,
you’ll fall in love with men.”
I stared at the glittering water,
its billion impurities invisible,
and figured Dad knew
my fusions, how desire
forged a path forward, forward,
every day widening,
wearing away. He’d chosen
this voice for me. My body
created an image of the speaker:
creased khakis, wedding ring,
lavalier clipped to white oxford
barely buttoned over his chest.
I wanted this image
to take off its shiny brown belt
and use it as my leash.
I wanted this image
to fall in love with me.

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James Davis is the author of the poetry collection Club Q, which Edward Hirsch selected for the Anthony Hecht Prize. His writing has been featured on NBC News and CBC Radio and anthologized in Best New Poets 2011 (selected by D. A. Powell) and 2019 (selected by Cate Marvin). Recent poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Bennington Review, The Gettysburg Review, Barrelhouse, Salamander, and Gulf Coast. He teaches English at the University of North Texas.