Cross Country Drive

Last week I cleaned out the files on an old laptop, and I found a bunch of writing that I thought was lost forever.  It took me a while to remember the time, place and situation that inspired some of it, but the feeling of the poem below came back instantly.  It was written after the last day of a cross-country drive (from Chicago to L.A.) that started a year of living in California.  I was trying to capture that moment where movement -- any kind of movement -- punches through and gives you a way to express what feels inexpressible.

Movement, dance, touch, massage -- all these body-based activities can support and encourage communication.  I see that as a side effect of the work I do, which is why you will find cards and pens in my office to record any ideas that came to you during your massage.

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Bed Diving

Barstow is a ghost town in training.

It rolls up after the desert 

dry concrete roads and boarded up strip malls

sun-bleached sky searing your eyes.

At the hotel, fatigue pulls away for a moment

bares the anger just behind.

We go bed-diving,

leap across the space from the door to the bed

let the springs flip and roll our bodies onto the floor.

The cross-country drive — nearly over —

coated us with fine gray dust.

We bed-dive through it,

and when we can barely breathe for laughing

we lie side-by-side, holding hands
fall asleep hard and deep, still in our sweat-stained clothes.