behind the wheel

At first glance it's not poetic,
what unfolds on this winter drive
through morning streets of Jonesboro,
partly withered urban, partly tired woods.

Yet it's having a way of making me wonder.

Each new curve through a spirit
spreading its gentle delirium.

Voila! -- here an old Dutch memory
sleeping under Jan van Goyen's varnish;
there a quality of far dead grandparents
keeping quiet vigil on their descendant;
and a moment ago blackbirds lifting
a shroud from melancholy eeriness;
finally a riddle of hushed branches.

You just never know when to expect
the muted ecstatic coming to the road.