She twists her hair, a tangle of thought and
doubt, and knot roaming
across her bones as an animal
seeking the pool.

‘We can lead them to water, but cannot
make them drink.’ she thinks.
She carries a rucksack with a monogram
of a name she never believed.

Hypnagogic, she misses the
boom bap of her heart, reaching for
air that is all around her,
but cannot love.

Pummeled by the distance of the land,
the continent swallows her,
she grips the grave with hungry toes;
one cannot bleed blood from a stone.

One cannot leave
their lonely, growling home,
when no seed ever took root.
Corners exist only with walls.

She departs with no knowing of where
the ghosts might lead,
where god might have set
the threshold that she eagerly searches.

‘I can walk the journey, but I cannot dictate
when it will end.’ she says.
She cups the sinking sun in her eye,
gets the hell out of Dodge.