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Looking out the window, I see countryside passing me in a blur. Cows and trees and barns become one, a violent clashing of memories and events and colors. The colors burn themselves into my memory and I know that fifty years from now, I will recall this day and how everything was muddled and how nothing was distinct.
I log hours on a train speeding eastward, contradicting the usual need of people to escape westward to California. I leave the ocean behind, the mountains behind, and I cross vast empty expanses of land and it all seems left for dead. Deep in my heart, I hear the land’s lonesome cry for attention. I hear the wailing of the deceased and I shudder. I clench my hands into fists and let my nails cut my palms. I hear screaming when I close my eyes. I want this train to travel faster.
At the end of the line, when I finally step off this train weary and disoriented, he will be there. He will watch me with guarded eyes. His hands will be in his pockets and his shoulders will be hunched. Only I will know what has gone on in the past, what has gone on in the thing I am escaping. California. The place we fell in love, the place we fought. The place we separated.
I head east because he waits there at the edge of another ocean. The train can’t move fast enough. My hours are spent reading words without comprehension. I spend my hours watching the colors mix. I spend my hours recalling his face. The train absolutely cannot move fast enough.
© 2004
1.15.04
