Oh, to be your highway,
stretching and connecting you.
I’d memorize your signs,
plan the stops, open my lanes,
sleep to the rhythm
of rush hour days,
certain we’d be driving somewhere:
the main artery of your life.

How quickly I see myself
in terms of trails,
dirty and uneven,
pocketed with pebbles,
a path traveled once,
but never looked back on.
Unmarked and unchanged,
just an outlying connection
that fades into undergrowth,
branching without notice.

Only today, I realized I was more
the unexpected detour,
sighs of an irritated traveler
seep from your grumphs
as you dump out your waste.
Recycling a pity pattern into me
behind sealed eyes.

Startling myself,
shameful as the faint scars
of an addict,
you roll down your sleeves,
I finally see:
I am not a headlight.
I barely raised pattern
on your flesh.