“Portland”

Published in The Magnolia Review

By Jennifer Christgau-Aquino

In Portland

            hesitating dew 

                          from a sycamore 

                          drips on the car

  I’m waiting for 

                     something to tell me 

                not to go and this 

           seems like it

                                                                        and rain

                                        We’ve packed 

                                                                       bags and flown 

                                  My youth so distant

                    along a braided, wet highway

              61 miles to go

through Sandy 

windmills and streudel 

                              now Chevron and Arbie’s

                                  that don’t fascinate me

                like my loneliness

                         is a story I can’t follow

                                    because everyone who drove this 

road is disappearing into

                 fog prickling along pines

                                                  passing east along

                rest areas and day use parks

I look for Tang at the store

              but they don’t sell it anymore 

                    my tongue sours 

                                       on what’s replaced the things

                                                  that made me

                     with the things

  I don’t know

in ZigZag there’s now a

                                                       whistle stop karaoke

and a pinball bar 

                                                                 quiet, quick snow falls 

                                            footprints on my window pane

                                   spreading stars

speeding past.