TO KANSAS, AGAIN

A– , this is gonna be the last summer I have for a while.

Out in this train’s horizon, there is:
         night stalks
         wheat
         sunset arriving in a sky
         that’s no longer ours
         stars scrambled in the flash and hum of
         the observatory deck.
         Chipotle.
         BP.

I don’t know a lot of things.
I don’t know the difference between:
         modern
         and postmodern
         Mennonites
         and Amish people
         vintage
         and retro
         honkey tonks
         and badonkadonks
         And whether you’re just being nice to me
         or wanna meet me in the train car bathroom
         for a new-time quickie.

O A–, these tracks are taking us to California.
But I’ll be stopped and topped in Kansas City.
And you, Arizona, looking for the saguaro blooms.

So, sit with me, still,
as we stick our boy-scout crust fingers into the carnitas.
And pull it apart, all tender.

         Between bites, I am still running
         under those orange lights
         the rest station before.

         You’re laughing and racing with bag in hand,
         loose grip on the rail, scraping all your melanin off.
         I stare at your bald spot, and it doesn’t bother me
         for once.

O A–, what if we didn’t make the train?
Rather, became two drifters balanced
on the rails,
waiting for Peril to hit us again on the tracks.
Orients making our own origin stories.

We’ll make out
of trail kills, fur coats and stews.
We don’t gotta argue.
If we’re the only things
keeping each other warm at night.

O A–, with all the spikes we’ll collect on the way,
we’ll sound so

Chink.                  You’re smiling while roasting up squirrels.
Chink.                  We’re hiding under pines to wait out the storm, your arm around my waist.
Chink.                  Next day and we’ve missed the Ark.

Chink.                  The storm never ends. To pass our times, I tell you about the teacher
who confused me with J– and H–. Said after all, we’re all just the sa–

Chink.                  The sound of gunpowder and nitroglycerin,
the avalanche sheeted over us.

A–, this is gonna be the last summer I have for a while.
A–, what do we make of ourselves as the horizon?

Paddy Qiu is currently an MPH candidate at the Gillings School of Public Health. Their work focuses upon the navigation of spaces, emphasizing the conduits of knowledge found in generational ripples and the nurture of interpersonal relationships. They are the 2023 Winner of The William Herbert Memorial Poetry Contest with honors including The John F. Eberhardt Excellence in Writing Award, The C.L. Clark Writing Award for BIPOC Writers, and The Henry Matthew Weidner Essay Award, being featured in FOLIO, Barzakh Magazine, Zoetic Press, Quarter Press, among others.