after hours, on main street


I sit in my car, on the empty grand avenue of my little town.
Main street is silent. But for a little bit of wind that blows, promising of more whether and perhaps the scattering of rain.
I am exhausted and I smell of dried milk and baby goats. I got off work half an hour ago and I am just checking in with the world before I disappear into the soft dark folds of my comforter in my dark and cozy cabin.
There are no stars tonight, the sky is clouded over by the almost rain huddling over the valley, you can feel it and how it wants to let go and just rain, but it's not quite heavy enough yet.

The glow from the street lamps are orange, they reflect on the dusty glass of my windshield.

I wait. I wait for darkness to envelop me, or sleep to over come. I wait for morning and summer and peaches dripping with sweet juice. I wait, because I don't know what else to do, and because the alternative is unnerving.
Christmas lights glow from red to yellow to green. Past their time but shinning on, giving their light to the dark and to who evers eyes wish to see.

Someone else's words echo in my mind: my skies are the flat yellow of several hundred thousand lives between horizons.
I am not there. I am not polluted and enriched with city life tonight.
     Tonight I am a humble farm girl, sore from filling bottles and buckets with milk, with holding baby goats as they ate dinner, sweeping floors and keeping count of lives. I am but a woman, sweaty and dirty and barefoot, wearing my carharrts, sitting alone with my border collie as the wee hours of the new day creep into the sky. I am holding onto my future in every breath I take, and I am trying hard not to cry.

I will hold onto this warm belief of love. I will hold the things that fill my soul as I drift off. I will whisper the dreams I have into the dark, because I already have ears that are listening. I am blessed with gratitude and things to be grateful for, even when I feel so overwhelmed I just want to lay empty on the floor.

Popular Posts