Under the orange glow of the streetlamp, watching the kids walk by in the road-- the river of dust they’ve known all their lives, I feel a hint of what it’s like to call this place home-- that these streets have been mine as long as I can remember, that I've walked them a hundred thousand times and know each step. I feel this for one fleeting moment and think of the places I have called home.

I watch the kids walk by on the street in the night-- a hand in the pocket, a push on the shoulder-- I think of summer nights and the ensuing nostalgia for the perfect summer night-- pieces of memory mixed with things that never happened. I remember the things I used to remember. I think of country roads and of driving in cars. Faces and voices I used to know stir up and swirl around like the sediment in a creek bed behind an old house. I think of hunting sand crabs as a boy on a gulf beach with a dollar-store flashlight, a net and Orion’s arc overhead.

I think of strolling by the door to this very house years from now, pointing it out to you, rust peeking out beneath the chipped olive paint that once smelled new; I think of all the places I've called home and how I’ve never returned.

I watch them walking by in the street with the same friends they’ve walked with since always.

I think of America, of the Midwest, of the sweet smell of the fields in the air; I think of idly strumming a guitar on the edge of my bed by the open window, imagining a shoreline in the night and the many places I’ve never seen.