several sweltering summers ago
while on a cross-country road trip
in a van we converted ourselves
from materials salvaged and new
we planned our next adventure,
and played the “one” game, too
 
the one where we wonder 
which one —and only one– we’d:

 
give
take
eat
drink
keep
change
 
 
 
 
 
et cetera…
 
 
 
 
you ask,
if your soul contained one song,
what it would be?
 
 
 
I could not answer.
 
 
 
we zoomed past nameless fields
and unremarkable mile markers 
through breaking states of highway hypnosis
heading west across the vast American landscape
and crossing back to the east coast, our imperfect Arcadia
where moths float free across fresh mowed grass
 
 
 
 
I could not answer–
 
 
 
 
 
at 80 miles per hour
at 60 miles per hour
at 40 miles per hour
at 20 miles per hour
at a full stop to fill up at the gas station with the analog pump
 
 
some summers later,
while drifting asleep draped in quilted moonlight
in the home we built from memories salvaged and new,
I settled on a track from Miles Davis’ Some Kind of Blue
–“Blue in Green”–
a track where all my existence:
past, present, and future
converge in Lydian dreams and melancholy impressions
felt, feeling, (not yet) foretold
 
in dreams my footsteps synchronize with ten-measured circular form
to bring me back to extended breath
relinquishing captive melodies 
to float on a moth’s night-sewn wings