On the Trail

I am looking up at the stars from a campground in Oklahoma. There is a train rumbling away in the distance, its mournful horn now fading. An armadillo was snuffling around the tent earlier but I think he’s gone on to bed. Two blue jays call to each other in the darkness, flat and toneless, like they are texting each other. I am headed home.

Like another fellow from Alabama, I spent a while out West chasing Billy the Kid. A few days ago I was trying to make his grave before dark but had to stop in Taiban to visit the ghost church. The setting sun had set it aglow, raw and windswept boards burnished like gold.

Don’t blame me for that bedspread, that was La Mesa up on Route 66. I would’ve stayed in Fort Sumner but didn’t want to have another gas station dinner. Instead I had tamales at the Silver Moon in Santa Rosa, Christmas-style, both red and green chile on top.

Seven states in seven days, Marty Robbins on the stereo, Townes Van Zandt singing “Dead Flowers,” two cemeteries, two museums, three cameras (one always with black & white), sleeping in hotels, motels, adobe, under the stars.

Another horn bleats closer as a new train passes. Time to boil a little more water for a second cup of coffee.