“How much longer?”
“Are we there yet?”
As the man smokes cigarette after cigarette
And the woman looks away at the dusty road
“Maa, how much longer, I’m so bored”
“Read the signboards beta, look at these charming towns!”
But the charming towns have nothing on display,
except grimy shops and bovine soirees.
Stale sandwich smell from the backseat fills the air
“How much longer for us to get there?
This plaintive cry snaps the man out of his reverie
“In twenty minutes, now be quiet for a while”
And so in silence passes almost a mile.
“Twenty minutes are over and I feel sick.”
“Oh give her a paper bag, quick!”
The sick was a false alarm, and the car speeds on,
Into the dusk, and then at night
It finally stops, and the parents alight,
Carrying their sleeping child.
(The painting is by Randy Hryhorczuk and belongs to him.)
