On the problems with business travel

In a pillbox at 35,000 feet

the real problem with business travel becomes readily apparent

This airborne defiance of fundamental physics has reduced us,

made us pop quiz parachutists

to Las Vegas, Chicago, Boston

to tired to explore the hills outside town

to grumpy to talk with the chipper waitress at the chain restaurant

where we ate last night

Hunting for shadows against a cloud,

some evidence of something more than transience

All this country conquered but unexplored and unnoticed

down in the checkerboard plains

or tucked in the snow covered ridges that look

like the paramecium doodles in a bored high schooler’s notebook

in a farmhouse beyond the interstate

there’s a man willing to share a cup of coffee if you knock

there’s a girl in Louisiana, aching

wondering if she’ll ever find the right man

there’s a boy in New York about to turn over the engine

on a rusting ‘92 Explorer

and drive it till it can’t go on

Let me ride shotgun

leaving the superhighways behind

crumpling up the map in the back seat with the empty soda cans

Peel back the top of this tin can

and cut the cords to my chute

and let me free fall into some roadside shack of a blues bar

where the beer is cold

and the jukebox only plays

long slow sexy guitar solos

Come talk with me and drink and dance close and breathe deep

until they throw us out

 

 

 

 

Done