Should I travel, displace myself from here to there,
when I am traveling each and every instant ,
scaling peaks in the mountains of time, losing
myself over and over and then returning
to someone who is someone else as well as myself?
Let Phnom Penh be, and Angkor Wat and China, too,
and Sydney and Patagonia and Durban, Chennai,
for my journey is here and my garden, mystery,
and this sense of traveling while staying in place,
is not a commodity, no thing for buying and selling
I traveled when I was young, went here and there,
before I discovered this voyage in a single place
that is vast beyond my imagining. I find it hard
to put down in words how I don’t take myself
literally but do take myself gently by the hand.
I am going where I am going and where I’m going
is here and near and far and I am the only ticket
that I need to get aboard and go abroad in my
own environs that I try to paint for my pleasure
and discover they and I slip away both together