Roadside Motel


We woke up to the sound
of a woman coughing into her bed.
And the rain. He was gone, like a passage
from a book when you stop
reading. The room recycled smells
on our clothes.
A shirt spat out a button.
We sat on the floor and considered
the window. The yellow curtains
with lipstick stains protected
us from ourselves. We would have looked out
and found his car missing.
We would have seen the relentless
sky in the absence of trees.
And the road as it stretched both ways,
like the arms of a father
who didn't want his children back.