Thought I’d spend this final week of the Halloween season revisiting some things of mine that seem to fit the mood.
When I first moved here to Schenectady, New York, a year ago August, moved in with my Sis and Nephews and some bonus cats, I was still doing a commute a couple of days a week down to the office in Beacon from up here until I could get to the point of being good with doing all my Beacon work remotely from Latham (2 plus hours on that drive by the way, so eventually getting to NOT needing to physically be in the Beacon office was huge and couldn’t come fast enough).
But there was this spot that I passed in my to an fro’s on this ride, along the NY State Thruway, what was once, surely, a vibrant, busy truck stop. It sat/sits vacant, boarded, graffitied, among all the other alive places I passed where you could grab some gas, a bit of shut-eye or maybe a bite to eat like you could here, just at another time.
A dead spot.
.
(August 17, 2024)
Exit 21B
It was raining dogs and devils
a night as thick as pitch
and thieves
of the day
but there was light …
Exit 21B
a promise of respite from the drive
that took so long to not quite survive
just yet
our destination
.
it shone, shimmered, sparkled,
harkened
Exit 21B
brighting our way
with promise
“Oh, that’s a place we could stay”
on this dark and stormy cliché
.
Truckers drank coffees
of known measure
two lumps or cream or straight
at a counter
ogling Mary’s offer’s weight
to refill a cup before return
to their trucks
dreaming in back bed sleep cabs
of another mug
.
We shook off the rain
just a wet stain
at our feet
in stilling puddles
.
“Do you have a room,
to escape soon now this horrid swoon
of weather?”
.
“Of course, just sign here Sir, Madame”
.
There were tables of chance
to win without even a glance
it was
easy
night was day
peasy
.
There were family and friends left to the wayside
justified
besides who are they
really
anyway?
.
We sang in bright neon lights
our day’s night might
wonder how we could have been so lucky to have lost our way
on a night dark as stark
stark as dark
to find this haven
Exit 21B
.
When we woke we stood to shake off the yoke
of another day’s night’s side step
then just to skip stop to our next
next stop
to the coast
but Exit 21B made us stay
.
We are here today
boarded up behind nailed wood windows
doors
long dead highway signs
long dead neon
long dead Mary
to fill a cup
a mug
of coffees
for trucker dreams
the coast always so far away
it seems
now
at Exit 21B
frankenberrysattic.com 