Saturday, January 1, 2011

WAYPOINTS


for Elizabeth Bishop

Comes a time, traveller, to rest your bones
by the roadside, to stretch out in a flowered
ditch, catch your breath and watch the patterned
play of sunlight and shadow on the membranes
of your eyelids, a few minutes or an hour
if needed. Comes a time at a trivial
junction to pause and reconnoitre,
reconsider flight plans and waypoints, wait
for someone with a wagon to pass by
and offer you a ride wherever it is
they're going. Comes a time when the sky
's dyed rose and darkening, to find a roof
or some other form of warmth and shelter
that might, on waking, be mistaken for a home.

1 comment:

NigelBeale said...

This sounds awfully like a early warning about the dangers of hitch-hiking,or accepting free rides...