she and I together again,
back in the deep forest,
communicating with the prospect of
nothingness. old friends, reunited.
cool drinks in hand, laughing uproariously,
plucking old re-purposed banjos.
any note will suffice, she says.
any method or schedule.
sounds too easy, I comment.
it is, she says.
that's the problem!
again, laughing wildly.
wandering around alone near the gravel pit.
the old river, the floodplain,
the buddhist memorial,
animals.
such basic realities!
(whatever that means.)
not sure.
spirals, coils, matrices, atlases.
meandering alone along sandbars.
tiny towns, some of them nameless,
if you can still believe such a vertiginous prospect
in this particularly "weary unto death" day and age-
sorry.
hey- let's go see what the "next" vista offers!
I agree- we pack foodstuffs, a few books,
the banjo, get in the car, feral, shivering,
gradually pull back out onto the next
unlit system of inter-states...
a lot of time passes.
we hover alone with our thoughts.
when we speak next, there's the distinct sense
that something has shifted in this part of the country.
she and I together again,
late at night,
toying with the prospect of mineral water.
an old issue, standard practice,
re-invested by the pure sentience of
absolute and semi-perfect circles of strangers.
anonymous.
it stays better longer that way,
the hand-painted sign seems to indicate.
we mull it over in solitude-
don't wanna keep making the same stupid mistakes
for the rest of our ridiculous lives.
it's too easy, someone comments.
but this time, no "identifiable crisis."
we sigh, clear our throats,
sink back into even deeper pockets
of urbanized wilderness.
unnamed, uncharted, understated, reflective...
(a little reluctant to admit that we had been at this precise
crossroads just a couple millenia earlier.)
