On Hearing Congress Has Declared October Sudden Cardiac Arrest Awareness Month

Stalled on I-94 outside Bismarck, I laugh at the AM-station news announcement that thirty-one days have been dedicated to the total dysfunction of the human heart. Indian Summer. What better time to praise the mystery of the Ford Focus’s transmission, the wind thrashing grit in my eyes, piles of bison shit hardening on the highway, Coke cans lodged in tufts of prairie grass (how long they last out here through so much weather).