When I Get There

It's almost sunset in upstate New York. Subdued blue hour. The clouds in the distance seem to stair-step from blue to a hazy lavender. Distance looks real from here.

 Moving again; in a few weeks I'll be a Mary in Maryland. That's the joke I keep telling people. Or sometimes I say, puzzled look fixed on my face, "I wonder if they'll consider calling it Fairyland?" No one laughs, which means I am making them uncomfortable. They don't know how to reply, because of the gay thing or because it's just not funny. Both of these things amuse me.

Moving makes me feel like a nostalgic fortune teller. I keep wondering, will I be happier when I get there? I am ruthlessly discarding the little things that have clung to me. Why does that make me feel like the I I am is changing?

 I have been known to visit the places I used to live. What part of me did I leave there. Is it recoverable. Who painted over it, do they own me now, are they just renting?

 What I am I leaving here. What I am I leaving here on the page. What voice do I say it with.

 It's all boxed up, the life is measured in square cardboards, my rooms scrawled across them in permanent marker. Why am I comfortable discomforted.

 Hello from the little bridge, the between.

 I'm walking toward you, a grin on my face.