One yellow light and a million cars
is all that stands in the way of my getting to work on time.
In the great wait of turning,
in all of the gaps between incoming traffic too small for me to fit through
I think about something dumb that I read once in a comic book
(or maybe watched in a cartoon a long time ago),
something about alternate timelines existing at the molecular level.
And I think about what universe lives in the molecules of that yellow light
which might as well be red. 
I envision pirates being carried in great pirate ships
pulled by camels across a long yellow stretch of sand
to plunder and kill anyone who might be travelling alone.
And who might be traveling alone?
Delivery people probably, 
slaves of the evil Quardabarth Corporation,
forced to carry out shipments of fidget spinners and fidget cubes
lest their spouses and children be fed to Withhlebob,
the great spouse and child eater. 
And in the cities
(safe from the plunder of pirates on ships pulled by camels)
the Quardabarth Corp sends its agents to kill and sabotage their competitors
and someone’s brother or son dies defending Quardabarth from theirs. 
Big men in big robotic suits die defending the great yellow dessert from invading aliens,
red ones from the north and green ones from the south,
beings whose survival can only mean the total annihilation of the other two
(or so they all believe).
Little robots in little men suits sit in bunkers
writing propaganda for the war and for Quardabarth 
and for anyone else with money in the pot
(a literal pot that dances and bites).
All of this happens for minutes and an eternity
until the man with his hand on the lever thinks–
that’s enough
and shuts it all off.
And the pirates, and the camels, and the salespeople, 
their spouses, children, the one who ate them, and the ones that owned him,
those who died on all sides, and their fathers, and their brothers,
and even the propaganda writing robots
will all be lost to the darkness and the abyss
for minutes and an eternity 
until it all starts up again.
And if I don’t make this left turn soon
I’m going to be late for work.