Nineteen was a good year-
Stroh's beer and tripping through Wheeling, West Virginia.
You picked me up, hitchhiking on Interstate 70,
And I never made it past Ohio.
I knew then it was so much better
To spend nights in love under the Steubenville sky
Than alone with a Kerouac book, as I do now.
But alone and afraid was my personal religion
And I dared not blaspheme my life away.
Maybe I could still be there now,
Standing with you on the bridge,
Counting the cars driving over to Martin's Ferry
(I gave you a kiss for each one with a New York license plate).
But I was scared, and so I had to lie;
And when I told you I was only staying because cigarettes
     were forty cents a pack,
You gave me your copy of "On The Road"
And I was in Pittsburgh by dawn.


©1997 Gail Von Schlichting




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