Road Trip by Jeff Weddle

Some go missing along the road 
choosing dark exits 
or strange attractions 
of dubious merit 
 
empty tanks 
and simple exhaustion 
take many
 
hitchhikers are common 
and sometimes change everything 
for good or ill 
 
and often 
it is simple hunger 
that brings everything to a stop 
 
or fear that the road 
is improperly marked
or heading in the wrong direction 
or the maps have lied 
 
some forge on 
through hard miles 
and often against the wind 
straight into the blinding sun 
 
windows down 
singing the old songs 
loud and sure 
not even worrying 
about staying on key 
 
there are many such roads 
and you are on one now 
 
someday you will know 
if you navigated well 
as you arrive at a destination 
you only thought you could imagine 
 
perhaps amazed 
with all illusion gone 
 
and every road
converging into one
ending as if by broken miracle 
in the very same spot 
though separated by time 
chance
and fickle grace

Jeff Weddle is a poet and writer living in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. He won the 2007 Welty Prize for Bohemian New Orleans: The Story of the Outsider and Loujon Press, and has also received honors for his fiction and poetry. Jeff teaches in the School of Library and Information Studies at the University of Alabama.