Child Lock

The driver is explaining his second divorce

while the interstate hums beneath the floorboards.

I’m looking at a yellow plastic sign

in the window of a passing sedan—

that little diamond that promises

something precious is inside.

The vinyl seat is biting into my legs,

the kind of heat that welds skin to plastic

until you have to peel yourself away.

I remember the smell of my father’s old car,

the way the locks would click shut

and stay shut,

long after we’d run out of things to say.