~A song is like a dream
and you try to make it come true. ~Bob Dylan
1.
Below an awkward, searing moon,
I can almost look forward to the drive.
Late on Interstate 10, I can go fast through the city,
boom, boom, boom, until it's behind me.
Determined just to get out, where the road
ends with the ocean.
His presence is here with me, in the car, a shiny
light or a shadow.
He sighs with sad politeness and settles in.
Desire is not enough. Stars spinning vertigo
above my head. I aim my grill west and follow
momentum. Dead or alive, it's your love I'm coming for.
2.
Horses, when they run, especially wild horses,
leave scars upon the earth. A Navajo once told me
this. They run, kicking up dust, nostrils flared, like
they've got butane in their veins.
I am like a wild horse.
Determined not to catch a hoof in the dirt.
Determined not to fall apart at the wheel.
He stares out the window or into his own eyes,
being reflected.
His timidness is too much to bear.
His solemness at having his essence vapored,
a misty passenger in my killing machine.
He wants to go back to writing songs.
He feels trapped with me.
Our conflicting emotions.
Mine are weak. His are strong.
3.
Eventually, all things come to pass.
I decide to be hopeful.
Spinning my wheels through the San Pedro
national forest, the dark and mysterious Joshua trees,
like men in a prison yard. They stand and wait.
True happiness is based on an illusion.
He already knows this. It's the exact image
he's been crooning about for years.
The secret to surviving, he turns now to tell me
in an emphatic whisper, snowflakes sticking to his lips,
is to first and foremost, arm yourself
with a ruler. Learn how to measure.
Don't struggle with the universe.
You can't win. You can not extract
nature from nature.
4.
He's telling me this. And I hear his voice
but my conscious begins to veer. Onto
the rusting fences, caught on a burr of barbed wire.
I have been driving for six hours straight.
The landscape has changed. The temperature
has dropped. There's moisture in the air. Clouds.
For millions, this is the promised land. California.
I could be highborn in the Himalayan's. Things
are just too much sometimes. I worry sick.
I pull over alongside Redondo Beach.
Various dozens of people, surfers mostly, a few
homeless, scattered along the shore and in the surf.
He carbons out through my open driver's side window.
I think, this is some crazy dream. He smiles. He has
the power to read my thoughts.
5.
There's an image I keep inside of my head. It's of him.
In moments of pure desperation, I dredge this image up.
We are together. We are in my car. He's sitting beside me.
In the passenger seat. He's wearing a coat with a lot of
zippers. He looks fresh. Smells clean, like soap and wind.
He's telling me: to follow that road. He's pointing.
The moonlight keeps getting refracted in his turbulent hair.
Jimmy Reed is confessing on the stereo. There is a lot of talk
going on inside of his head, but I can hear it. I am drifting in
and out of awareness. I come to long enough to light his
cigarette. How can you tell if something is real? I ask him
in a moment of clarity. Focus on the road. He answers pointing,
nodding his head. The smoke from his cigarette swirls and drifts.
A song of his comes over the radio. It's long and sad. I can
tell he is not okay. Flame poised, I ask, What is it? He dances
around the sulfur. In the distance, coyote howl.
6.
When I am driving and the weather is nice, I feel beautiful
in a way I could never explain.
First, there's the fact that I am alone.
Second, I'm in my car.
Third, I've got Love and Theft blowing the roof off my VW.
There are stages of infatuation. Degrees.
Steps down. He has no clue. I don't think,
of how much of my life he holds in his teeth.
I'd be afraid (almost) to tell him. Afraid he'd
feel some sense of responsibility or worse,
remorse. Instead, I throw stones in an imaginary
river. Imagine ripples. Imagine fish. Imagine his
soul is a carp. Wonder how the water feels.
7.
He is looking for seashells. Collecting them in
a plastic bag he found floating on the sand. He's
humming. Some foreign tune I've never heard.
I want to go with him. I want to funnel myself
into a shell. I want him to finger the sand from my
grooves. I cross the beach. Stick my feet in the
Pacific ocean. There's no telling what life will bring.
What's in store. Ssshhh. The ocean answers,
like a door swinging closed. His presence can still
be felt. His thoughts as well. He thinks I should
climb back into my car and go home. He doesn't say it,
but I can hear it. I'm in a state of heightened awareness.
When will I see you again? I want to know.
Shrugging, he answers, You came to me.
8.
There are instances when the heart falls silent. Almost dead.
It doesn't seem possible but it is. The trick to get it going again
is to beat it into behavior. My dream was to drive away. Off
into the happily-ever-after. It seems magical. A notion of
ridiculous proportions. Because one of us is not here,
perceived, felt, but not physically here, there's no saying what is real.
What is not real. I remember looking forward to the long drive back.
To the music. I remember seeing him in my rearview mirror.
The bulk of his upper body waving.
I chewed on my nails for a few miles, twirled my hair.
I rapped a riff on the dashboard. I shed a few tears.
Hours later, I am still listening to his music.
His last album was like a long and overdue embrace.
The lyrics lifted me to my feet and hugged me for two solid hours.
It's nice to listen to it. It's nice to listen to all of his music.
The old and the new. I miss having his apparition sitting shot gun.
I miss badly his voice, correcting, reasoning, explaining the meaning of life.
Sometimes I have dreams about him,
and I awake to the thought that he's back, closer than ever.
Right behind me, beside me, maybe lingering somewhere
between my heart and my mind, drifting here and there.
I remember, I am driving down the highway,
there's a soft wind kissing my hair.
I've got one hand on the wheel and the other out the window. I'm touching air.
One song is indulging me senseless, another is on its way.
A poet and essayist, Lisa Marie Zaran currently resides in Tempe, Arizona with her husband and two children. Her work has been published in numerous magazines, including Poetry Tonight, Exsanguinate, Black Dirt Press, Indie Journal, A Writer's Choice Literary Journal, 2River View, Whillow, and Thunder Sandwich.
Lisa has lived a varied life, moving over 40 times before the age of fourteen. Because of this she has found an amazing well of ideas in which to write about as well as an appreciation for the many, at times terrifying, experiences she has had as "the new kid in town."