Clothed in unwashed rags,
my body was 20 and inebriated by the journey
I had inherited for myself.
I was on a bus on 101,
heading north to visit a friend
who had been going to school in Arcata, California.

Passing the spectacularly long grapevines,
I wrote long, unending sentences
and hummed them to myself as if they were prayers
from droplets of light above.

And in my long periods of silence,
I thought of what I would do when
I finally arrived at the northern coast.
"First, I think I'll take my shoes off
and dance around a little bit
and dip my feet in the sand.
I'll howl skyward, with my only friends,
my body and the spirit of the sky,"
and I did.