The Line

the road goes ever on and on

The Line

The weary traveler
lay down your head,
let me scatter thyme upon your sheets and
soak your calloused feet in rosewater.

We'll find meaning in the clouds,
sunlight watering the blue,
the whippoorwill welcoming an early moon
with a sad, earthy cry
heartbroken in its timbre.
The cattails shake in the swamp below
and the sparrow's nest is empty.

There's dust on your skin,
which is sunburnt by time and 
sleeping under starlight;
your stomach ripped apart by Jim Beam 
and jackrabbits you've shot in the dark,
their meat fire-roasted, blood 
seeping under bitten nails:
the prey, the sacrifice, 
too deliciously cruel for words.

Spiders lay eggs, play house in your boots,
spinning webs like the wrinkles 
on your old face, cross-hatched in silver lace,
so intricate I'm forced to lay reverent kisses
on your weathered brow
to smooth away the unfortunate scars.

I ask you to stay 
but the road calls to you, your only love 
of rock and asphalt and an endless horizon.
You do not walk towards, only away,
from me, from memory, from a life together
where my laugh is your final destination
and your heartbeat my compass true.

So stay, stay and love me.
Please don't go on.