We’ve done this before.

We’ve snuck out at night.

Runaway teenagers.

Dangerous rides.

Lived vagrant and unmoored, but trusting.

We’ve stared at the drained buildings in the lonely cities.

Every morning people left for the office and we sat alone and listened to the hissing radiators.

We roamed the streets and crossed the bridges and then the oceans.

We took trains and rides from strangers.

Only to be home again.

And now that the last harness has dropped

And the body loosens

Escape and return are the same.

We didn’t know roots could be pulled free.

The house is bought, the house is sold.

The foundations defiant, the parents defiant.

And who will be seduced by those rocks now.

Our arms will flail in someone else’s sky.

So spread me in the water

Spread me in the breeze, a flying woman

Until this last warmth disappears.