On the Road
No one needs to know where I’m going on the coldest day
of the year, my vision spread out across the highway, taking in all
the land has to offer—the pastures, houses, creeks, junk piles.
I listen to what the tire tread does on the ice, and I long to see
what must come, what little and large must be, strangers who move
ahead of the snow in the insular hours, hermits bound to secrecy,
recluses bound to lives of closets and time. On the road my life makes
sense. What I’ve been told becomes background. No guilt arises
in my rearview mirror, no chattering or praying hands, no shame.
I prepare in moments of mercy for hours of rage when distance
develops an itch. At pit stops I shave and set my clock, observe
the rising sun, the fleeing deer. What more is there to know than
what I see? A man tells me that the world is growing violent around me,
and I cannot stop it. I tell him the world is not my concern.
The stained-glass morning comes, its face a broken yolk. I watch
the headlights form shadows, the miles ahead a mystery.
Joel Fry
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