It was noon, sometime in mid-July;
Imagine the road, a twisting highway to my grave.
The bus, a roller coaster ride unhinged from the tracks.
Dodging missiles with headlights, horns rattling my nerves.
Just another three hours.

It was midnight, somewhere out at sea,
Somewhere in the universe, the Milky Way, another galaxy.
A shallow heartbeat, a distant echo of a Chinese Karaoke show, but all else was still.
The stars never seemed so vast, and I remembered that they were bigger than me,
I was just a speck.

It rained on the way back to ** Chi Minh,
The roads turned to rivers, the scooters grew ponchos; under them a family of three.
The city brought chaos; sad, tired faces, begging for one thousand ****; a cent.
The children danced in the downpour, jumping over sticks
Like hopscotch.

I thought of Ha Long Bay, just the night before,
I couldn’t hear the silence; I couldn’t see the stars; a dingy hostel ceiling, grumbling strangers snores.
I went to sleep dreaming of peaceful valleys, fresh spring waters, trees as far as the eye could see,
For tomorrow was a new day,
The next part of my journey.