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The Plan Was To Take Route 66

plans change

By Erin LucasPublished 2 years ago Updated 2 years ago 2 min read
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I took myself for a drive today. I had a plan, a destination in mind. I came to the split in the highway and my intuition said “Guthrie.” This destination felt different inside than the plan I originally had. I felt my solar plexus. I turned off Maps. I went.

I hit construction while finding new roads. I smiled and tapped to my music as I sat at red lights in the distance, squished between impatience and hazard cones. I kept driving. I kept listening to my gut. I followed 77 North as far as I could. Along the way, I had to double, triple back sometimes because roads were closed and dead ends are a thing. I kept driving. I kept listening to my intuition.

I came to a crossroad after passing fields of hay and one home that got me. The racing barrels were ready in the arena next to a pumpjack and a doublewide. The moment I stopped at the +, I knew, go right. I had managed to take Broadway to Highway 33. My knowing was right and so was the turn, but I only took it after verifying with Maps that it was the right way to go. I ended up circling the Masonic Lodge. I knew it was there before I got there. Past life? Who knows.

I took a different path home. I ended up on a red dirt gravel road. My Lil’ Priestess was nervous about our seemingly remote status. I ended up at another crossroad, red dirt gravel in all directions. The intersection was Western and Sorghum Mill. I really loved that intersection and I took a memory picture of it. Afterward, when I got home, it all poured out of me.

Red gravel roads of curiosity

Are driven, not with ease always

But driven all the same

The terra cotta earth

Gives way by force

To cement and caliche, mixed and tumbled

Easier to consume, some may say

Than red gravel

The pattern of slow ease

From the earthen roads

Isn’t as welcomed on the cement

Here, they want to go faster

Here, they begin to dis-miss the deer

On the wooded shoulder

Because it becomes a blur at these speeds

This seemingly better road then changes

It becomes

A freshly painted line of yellow polka dots

And a smooth tar finish

The speed limit is faster than ever

Sports cars and pressure tailgate your rearview

You try to wave them past you

So you can continue your speeds and patterns of slow ease

They continue to hug your bumper

They flash their headlights of impatience

You speed up

Your terracotta patterns don’t suffice

In a world of tar

They’ll always be too natural, easy, slow

If all you can do is race to finish lines of

Paved over paradises with

Roads that lead to nowhere, fast

nature poetry
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About the Creator

Erin Lucas

she/her

Multimedia Creator, Writer, Educator, Nonprofit Organizer

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