You

Sometimes I come home, after a long day of work, or just a long day, and I am driving and I'm tired, and just when I hit the particular stretch of road that winds through pinion bushed New Mexico dirt, I abandon all comfort and see shadows that turn, that twist, that snake through the earth, shadows that are sharpened and chained to the sun by the day but roam free through the night, and I remember the day, when the shadows are ruled, the light, when the sun makes the sands sparkle and jump, my particular stretch, my road, my path; when my thoughts are too thick and too many, (dammit, it's four in the morning!), and I am an alien, a tourist with a roadmap and Jersey plates, on my road, just a cry from home, my home, that lies just a few thoughts ahead, a few seconds, a few paces, but these are long thoughts (well, at least I think now but not in a minute), and uncertainly, confused, lost, I stumble blindly down a path, for it is a path now after years of neglect (and there are big holes in it), searching for a street sign, a landmark, something. It's a long day I say, and it's dark, and it's your street, stupid, wake up. And the car is overheating, and my life is melting, and now its raining because it is New Mexico and if the sun were out you would still see blue sky, through thick cool water flattened on the windowpanes. But it stopped again, and the sun is out, and all of a sudden I realize the landmark was there all the time, and the street signs glisten in wet afterrain paint, and in light my neighbors ugly white trailer seems almost quaint, and the "get the fuck off my property" sign hung upside down, almost artistic, poetic I think, and the plastic bag that blows up and around with the throw of the wind, just perfect it seemed, and it is then, just then I think, no I'm sure, as the plastic bag flies over my windshield and I make the final dip, the road unfolding downhill into my valley, my kingdom, and the dogs run to greet me, it is just then, for just a second, but a long second, one of those rare seconds that are beautiful and fleeting and last a lifetime, it is then that I know, and you open my door.

Vajra Alsop