The Road (thoughts of Kerouac)
9th May 2024 (amended 23rd June 2024)

Bright red LED lights broadcast petrol station fuel prices,
scouring traffic noise from the freeway an arm’s length away,
traffic lights and intersections, wash buckets for windscreens,
the sound of turning tyres on loose black stones.

Bitumen here disappears to horizons on each side,
…of whatever, wherever, this place is.

This place ...it is drawn out isolation, and it is utility,
no cosiness of city streets or gentrified cafes here,
here are microwaved pies and dollar coffees in take away cups, lip burning plastic lids offering no care, taking no responsibility,
here are the absent expressions and unresponsive natures of disinterested cash register attendants… forlorn, and downcast.

The forever twilight that exists here offers space for the interplay of thoughts,
but be careful, it is not for thinking;
for nothing is resolved here by the road,
…only passed through.

Fish on Hotel, Fish Creek,
Australia