Fifty years we waited for our trip of a lifetime.
That unbridled excitement in your eyes as we first boarded
mellowed into autumnal warmth
as the train rocked us into a gentle serenity:
reminding me of our days off the Georgia coast
where the tides receded and retreated,
uncovering what mattered in life.
Our small island seemed so distant. Periwinkle blue skies of the Midwest
swallowed the flat land whole as the sun sank into
fields of bronze and rust. Vast prairies lingered on the touch of clouds
as the horizon merged with the Earth. Milwaukee’s chipped brick warehouses and
Minot hay bales slipped by the window frames. We watched as the steel gray cars glided past sparse skinny trees, stretching the seconds between each smile and sigh.
The observation car was our favorite place for conversation:
recollections of days in the office and classroom
punctuated by low lying fences and
good natured jokes about the packaged food served in the dining car.
We had dreamt of this trip for so long.
As the ridges and fields flew by, I enjoyed every moment. You sweetened
all those hours, like sugar in our afternoon tea.
We happily recounted our blessings and
drew excitement from the promise of adventures to come.
But all those maps and travel videos
could have never predicted our destination,
where we expected to see the kaleidoscopic hues of a western sunset,
only dust.
The brightest star descends, but we will see it again.
Not above the dry brush and twisted metal of Joplin, but somewhere more divine.
I am still content, holding your hand, embracing this journey,
at the end of our empire.
Writer To Writer Literary Journal 