Off a two lane highway in the middle of Kansas
sits a motel with a blue vacancy sign
next to a tiny park in a tiny town
with a Santa Fe Chief train engine,
its coal car and a towering sign
that tells travelers they are
“1500 miles from New York,
1500 miles from San Francisco,”
where I find a room so tiny and cave dark
I slide into a sleep I’d forgotten
since I lost myself in cities
away from the raw smell of the earth
I curl peacefully, the hermit in me
thankful for the gas heater, toilet, lamp,
chair and bed, the antique quilt
protecting me from the high plains wind,
the sub zero Fahrenheit of my fear,
confident the new Pakistani proprietor
will leave me alone in the morning
with whatever secrets I’ve check in with
When I awaken to the sounds of semis
banging across the highway bridge,
I take comfort in the aromatic leftovers
of cinnamon and cumin
from the Pakistani’s lunch,
the same comfort I felt
when my father ran water
to shave as I half slept
in the smell and crackle of the bacon
my mother fried in a cast iron pan
during the weather report