Travel

Travel


There’s always the chink in the armor, the catch in the plan.
From his garbled mid-flight explanation, some business associate
with legal complications settled an old score and got leverage
by suggesting a better target, who turned out to be Peter.
Sophisticated surveillance has brought jeopardy to our home.
We must flee.
Peter has appropriated a car.  He lifts me into the trunk
along with a valise full of cash and a garment bag
full of personal belongings – his, not mine.
I travel as I am.
But why am I traveling now, in this mobile container?
I am carried, not by my own power, into a new life.
Though this anonymous road is not the river of the dead,
I am ferried into novelty, unknown territory, a kind of transformation.
And why should Peter carry me?
I am his ace in the hole to immortality.
Perhaps he also feels that we are in this adventure together,
a team of convenience but also camaraderie.
Or maybe, like the cash and belongings, I am something
of value he has acquired.
Of course I can leave at my volition.
I can leave his intentions when I’ve somewhere to go.