What is the price
We pay for daylight
Just to wander
Routes so restless
Which rob our nights
Of darkness
From journeying
Farther than sleep?

These vacant dreams
Keep changing
Where desert skies
May guide us
Towards burning signs
Near roadsides
Beyond such peace
Now lost,

As life seems wrong
In transit
During journeys long
On railways
When crawled by foot
While begging
With thumbs reached out
That shake –

Like walking now
Though dazed
But expecting hope
Come sundown
Around old friends
Still waiting
Under neon bulbs’
Dim glow,

Through ghost towns
Always awake
And somehow
Eerily radiant
Feeling lost
Along every exit
Seeking one more chance
Getting home.

My vagrant faith
Must grasp
This abandoned world
Soon ending
Knowing cars can’t cross
Over memories
Or pause at stops
Never there,

Wishing God himself
Had His turn
Fixing broken paths
Even hotter
Beneath motel roofs
Going missing
After decades
Facing decay –

Letting landscapes
Wickedly bright
Draw horizons
Growing decrepit
Chasing promises
Forcing exhaustion
Seeking answers
Running away.

• J. Pigno