the drifter

Johnny Cash is on, playing "I'm a Drifter", and I'm working on a Sunday afternoon. Little E has set up a village of dolls next to me, barking orders, pronouncing made-up names with little flourishes. The cat is sleeping between my bare feet.

Got no one to call my own no more.

Got no strings to tie me down.

Got no cause to hang around.

What difference does it make, which way I go?

I hear some noise from upstairs. It's not the workers in the hallway, dropping paint cans, chipping away at broken tiles on the floor.

I'm a drifter,

A lonesome drifter.

No, it's the steady creak of a bed, thumping against a wall. You can hear them, if you filter out the other sounds. He is talking to her in a low voice. She makes a sort of squeal and then a short moan.

I pour myself a glass of water and watch the tiny bubbles rising.

Got no place to call my own no more.

I'm a wanderer,

A lonesome wanderer.

E looks up at me. She's happy, playing restaurant, completely in her own world. The cat rolls onto my slipper, looking for an even better sleeping place. I wonder if I'll ever get the chance to take my guitar out of its case and write a new song like I used to on days like this. I used to get takeout Chinese food from Mee Fun on 1st Avenue and 13th street on Sunday afternoons, standing in line watching the steam paint the windows, the soup guys splashing broth over the wontons, sipping tea from giant plastic takeout cups, sometimes looking me in the eye, recognizing me.

She repeats her sounds - an unchanging cycle. I can't listen to them any more.

Staring at my hands, I close my eyes and listen to my own breathing. I force myself to smell Spring coming. I remember how I would split a long piece of grass and hold it between my lips when I was a boy. I think of women I have known on quiet afternoons like those people upstairs. I think of a little bedroom with the lights off. Her giant white comforter is luminous on a rainy day as I kiss her shoulder and ask her if she's getting hungry. That was a long time ago. She has a child of her own now.

I wish those guys would start working in the hallway again.

Who can know what waits beyond this road?