On traveling

WanderLost

Photo by xandro Vandewalle on Unsplash

It was the romantic image of a broken compass,
the #1 in the bucket-list, the thrill, the wow,
the cliché, the world map writs tattoo,
the fact that I could not backtrack my steps
to the one bus station that I recognized in this city
that tempted me to jump in a puddle of rainwater
and relish on the smooth wonder of where to go
when I had purposely set myself to stroll and get lost.

All that until a couple asks for directions that I don’t have,
and before I invite them to retrace the maps on their hands,
in a tone that shatters light, the woman confesses:
“We just never seem to end up where we want to.”