The First Day on the Road

 

From a motel in America

 

Traveling in our own country

in that edge of time

between autumn and winter

The few tenacious trees that

still cling to vibrant songs of red

so joyous in defiant singing

in the concert of grey, brown and dark green

that has begun.

 

Not like the holiday travels

in warmth and sunshine

we wake to darkness and drive

until well after darkness comes again

shivering inside to think

of working in the cold of night

to create some little home

to shelter sleep.

 

This first night instead

tired and full of the sickness

stretching around the globe

like a fungus

we find a motel by the road

and feel the comfort

of a bed and sheets and

nice soap

as if travellers from

a place of tents

and beds on hard ground.