by Elizabeth Morse

Monica and Joyce set out for mountains in a beat-up SUV.
Anytime is a good time for this much-loved excursion.
The radio plays songs from years ago, as though time
has been sliced open. They talk, and drink bottled water.
Monica pulls back her hair, flicking the fastener once, twice.
Their words spin crimson sorrows and flaming complaints.
The rising and falling of voices visits the landscape
around them, opens windows and windshields.
Anytime is a good time to talk about people they know.
Joyce frowns and pays for sandwiches, biting hers and
discarding the wrapper as though it’s the hours she regrets.
Back in the car, the radio plays songs from years ago,
letting Monica and Joyce feel young womanhood again,
Noxema, skim milk and eggs over easy, delighted to recall.
Anytime is a good time to picture the recent past as well,
dark summer lakes, injured children, drunken husbands.
Monica and Joyce drive switchback roads in their SUV,
content by themselves, family members remote or dead.
They can see their destination, a cabin lost in distant history.