Poetry: "My Heart Lives Here"

This one was inspired by a recent drive from Boston to Vermont's Northeast Kingdom. I hope you enjoy it.

My Heart Lives Here


Highways narrow as the land expands;
swaths of white under a near full moon.

The boys shift and sigh, mingled
breath opaques the back windows.

Midnight roads unravel, cross streets
erased from the map as we pass.

On the next rise, the barn appears
again, its roof swallows stars.

Houses exhale, their dreamers burrow
into patchwork memories of warmth.

No mailbox spells my name in letters
that shine under the sweep of headlights.

I could drive past every village;
no one knows our destination.

ljcohen, 2007