You might be standing
in the same spot when you hear
about it.  You'll see the river barely
moving in the moonlight, snow
shining like bones.
You can almost see the four
in the trees, still as deer,
looking for a fire ring.

They say the boys said sex
or else, sex or we leave you here
where the road slopes down
into water,
where no one lives,
where you'll walk five miles
without coats.  Sex
or we'll do it.
Their breath
steaming like horses'.

The two girls from out of town
did, their bodies then
instruments for survival.
They returned, legs burning,
on the laps of the green-eyed
boys, ice cracking under the wheels.