Asphalt miles vanish beneath ever-thinning treads.
Sometimes a truck passes and the car trembles.
The truck fades, a memory in the rearview mirror,
and in that distance behind us, we see freedom.
In the miles between radio stations, voices crackle
from Mexico from Flagstaff, islands in a static soundtrack.
The lines on the map folded on the dash become
highways through the desert, the smile on your lips.
From pine-shrouded campgrounds to painted ruins,
roadside motels to cars, wrecked and rusting in the desert,
and in the night-crashing waves of the western shore,
we learn the meaning of these secret messages:
rhythm of wheels, music of static, your hand on my knee,
the elegant whisper of trucks traveling the other way.
James Brush is a teacher and writer who lives in Austin, TX. He tries to get outside as much as possible.
Very nice — the romance of the road, the quintessential American story.
A wonderful sense of place & travel at once. Satisfying to an AZ gal who went to CA. Feels so right.
Thank you both. It’s good to know some of these road poems are working.