About last spring

Moon River tells me
There’s Such a lot of
World to See
and i remember a drive
in a rental car
on a raised wooded road
historic stops every dozen miles
re-enactors chopping wood
spinning yarn
flipping flapjacks
offering a rustic coffee in a tin mug
you were not there
already gone
and I was roadtripping to see
your brother Dave in February
Natchez Trace and Jazz
or my cousin Maggie in April
backyard cocktails
can’t quite remember which escape this
was from the world where
you weren’t living any longer
and I was trying to be
out exploring
in a tiny rental car between smallish regional airports
but this one particular memory
driving through the trees
perched up high on a two-lane
off the forest floor
lush green ubiquity
so foreign to a desert child like me
nothing clean and spare
no sandy minimalism
Andy Williams and Audrey Hepburn
can sing to me from 1961
and I can scrutinize every costumed historian
putting on an act for the tourists
but you’re not among them
just a glimpse at the future through the foliage
and I’m not certain
you even liked
Breakfast At
Tiffany’s