You always tell me the same story

He's in love with a scene from the winter
that occurs on a trip to Washington,
when the dark is constant and the trees jog
like legends alongside the highway;

as his eyes fall half-sleep but his senses remain
taut and vigilant, sweating on the wheel,
pitching nerve to the sound of branches cracking,
bristling under his wind-torn jacket;

the time of evening when the sunset rests
at its very highest, bright and sudden as Heaven,
an aureate glow around the birdsongs,
the stench of roadkill muted by a golden frost;

a taste of nirvana,
an instruction of faith,
the blatant existence of God,

lost as soon as he rounds the bend.