A lifetime of roaming.
The yearly resettlements
sometimes seasonal,
sometimes furtive.
Renting
month to month,
sometimes weekly,
in all the scattered
towns cities countries.
Living
paycheck to paycheck
never being quite sure
if the next swipe would be approved.
The date when it wasn’t.
Payday loans at 391%
with a smile
at the returns they knew were coming.
The bus ride to the repo company
to retrieve a box of CDs
some used tissue
and a 2008 AAA highway
map of the States,
page corners bent,
others missing.
Sleeping at rest stops
finally
when nowhere else was home.
And now,
now
somehow
on the verge
of signing a loan
for my first house
but feeling like financing a tomb
for the certainty
its bricks will provide,
the privacy of its trees and the lockable garage,
the recycle bin sure to be filled
with faded maps of all
that was and was not missing
from the old life.
But I’ll do it,
I will,
if you, my friend, agree to come over
at least once for the house
warming and once
more for the wake.
Dave O’Leary is a writer and musician in Seattle. He’s had two novels published and has published work in, among others, Slate.com, Versification, and Reflex Fiction. His collection of poetry and prose–I Hear Your Music Playing Night and Day–will be published in May 2021 by Cajun Mutt Press. You can find him on Twitter @dolearyauthor.