4: Wednesday

I'm somewhere in mountains
of Tennessee Big Ridge nearby Norris
Lake deep blue that isn't blue at all in the
night, sorry I didn't call baby, there's no
service this high in the Appalachians, today
we cut through Louisville, Frankfort, Lexington
and tomorrow the entire Shenandoah lies ahead,
under the full moon I apologize it's a beautifully
cool silent night with crickets singing for the coming
winter and me on a bench in the dark
writing to you, my love, it's November,
Dave and I will be sleeping in a tent and Joe
in his hammock ready, I'll drink some Port
I swear it, I'm a road bum trying to be a
Dharma bum, it's Wednesday turning to Thursday a
few stars above outside Knoxville, where we tried to
light a fire but the rain had soaked everything in the
last few days was a mortal enemy and failure is
darkness embers dying orange, are we impervious
to time? Is there time at all? in the wilderness it seems
there isn't, when was the last time I held your hand?
Felt our bodies together in the night? Dave got a text message
from an hour into the future, are we lost? I wonder with the
night Tennessee purple, you've never seen darkness
like this, will the clouds ever point our way home?
We are the road.