Adelaide

I named my car Adelaide
and she makes me want to sing
and the open road is calling,
but he...
He kicks up his heels and runs aground:
left hand on the steering wheel,
beckoning to cardboard cities like
a lighthouse through the fog.
And he says he won't drink because of
her
but he'll tilt my feverish mind
astride these trampolines
and paper cranes.
No, wait.
I'm confused.
"You're awesome," he says.
"I like you."
And my stick figures stand amazed
on some hill by some sea somewhere.
Slow down!
My cardboard cities crumble...
'I like you,' you said?
Now, there's not much I won't do these days.
There's not much I won't think or say,
but every time he walks away
I
can't
breathe!
... and that matters to me.
So I'll pack my trunk
and as I'll settle, in my funk,
a staticy, bassey blue will croon its soothing sound waves
and I'll fly
faster
and faster;
and, at fifty,
the spattered glass will collect
and give birth to raindrops,
which, in their defiant creation,
fall up
and mock the tears on my face,
for, I won't know where I'm flying to;
but I do know that I'm fine
flying
at fifty.
So I'll go
on my own,
because the open road is calling
and Adelaide won't wait for long.



Florida 2009