On Travels Between Dreamstates: West

Roadside Pick Up Advice

Sign reads:
End of roadwork.
Speed limit 75 mph.
Pass with care.
Is there any other way
to make a pass?

Stephen Hawking’s Comfort Inn

Sleep pulls at my pulleys.
Going to bed,
I am my own
physics experiment.

Storm Chasers

data collectors on your cars’ rooftops.
bagels and coffee over laptops.
Stickers and license plates
declaring a joint venture between
Texas Tech and the University of Michigan.
It’s the storming season.
Would I be a 6 on your Fujita scale?

Salina, UT

Mom’s Cafe
open since 1929.
Scones here are not British
but more like warm Indian fry bread
with honey butter syrup.
At the gas station next door
the clerk behind the register
flashes his fists for me when
I inquire of his tatoos.
One letter on each knuckle:
S-E-L-F M-A-D-E.

Optimism

On I-70 West through Utah
where there are snow capped mountains
and it is late May and 65 degrees,
I mistook a AA nickel cadium hydride
battery for a tube of chapstick
and now my lips feel somewhat
positive.