Outside
the convenience store,
some old drunk waving
four dollar bills at me.
“Hey! Can you take me
to the bar?
That one on the road
up to the rez? I can pay you.”
I like his silver
cuff and hate
my father’s face
on him. “Oh sorry,
not going that way.”
He smiles
and walks away to wait for
the next possibility —
I like his silver ring
and hate how he’s got
my dad’s face, my messed-up
smile.
When I move, you move…
Truckstop, train station, bus station,
airport, port; remember when those
were the easy way out,
and no one watched you leave?
Remember sticking a thumb out on the highway?
The all-American way
to travel, depend on the “we’ve all been there”
thing…except we haven’t
and “we” means nothing anymore,
if it ever did, if it was ever anything more
than an illusion.
Good old flag-wrapped dreamtime,
the American walkabout,
legend woven into collective self.
When I move, you move…
Try to recall what it was like.
Tell yourself
we used to trust one another.
Tell yourself
travel was a communal experience
and no one except small town cops
ever patted you down,
and they always let you go on your way
after taking the weed you’d hid in your sock.
Remember
you didn’t care much
because weed was cheap
and no matter where you ended up
you knew you could find more
one handshake away.
When I move, you move…
We used to travel without a lot of thought.
We used to travel without a lot of anything.
That was how you became American:
you just got on the road.
Had philosophical encounters and wild,
anonymous sex. Discussed the meaning of life
in the back seat of a big boatcar
with someone who picked you up
on the way to a Dead concert, a festival, your brother’s house
in Middleburg Heights.
Found a crash pad in a city
you reached before reaching
the city you wanted to end up in,
and decided to stay there for a while…
When I move, you move…
Everyone’s so damn stationary now.
No matter the size of the beat surging out of the car
the car sits still and only moves in place,
and no one picks up hitchers, ever.
No one buys a ticket last minute
and gets on a plane without running a gauntlet.
No one rides a train at all
and we fear the buses will smother us
in other people’s germs…
we don’t move at all
without knowing exactly where we’re going,
without a screen to tell us exactly where we’re going,
without a plan as to where we’re going,
only going where everyone else is going.
When I move, you move…
just like that.
Dark Matter 