The Unmapped Cartography of Motion (A Journey Across the Veins of a Nation) #poetry

I. The Prelude: A Decision Unmade

Airplane? A silver-winged bird,
a fish in the sky gulping clouds,
spitting out distances like chewed-up gum.
But no—too fast, too unearned,
a magician’s trick where the ace appears
before the deck is shuffled.

Train? A metal snake slithering on iron veins,
puffing, huffing,
swallowing time in rhythmic gasps—
but its tracks are tattoos on the land,
predetermined, predictable, already scripted.

Bus? A road-weary beast, lurching like an old drunk,
laden with stories and sighs,
choking on diesel dreams.
No, I need the wind to touch my bones.

Car? Four-wheeled soliloquy,
a private monologue between asphalt and mind,
stopping where the heart breaks,
but is it freedom or a cage with leather seats?

Bike? A two-wheeled prayer,
muscles chanting against the wind,
a communion of sweat and road dust.
Yes. Yes! Maybe.
Maybe I take them all.

II. A Symphony of Wheels & Wings

(First Movement: The Skybound Paradox)

I begin with wings, strapped into a coffin of clouds,
where time is an accordion, stretched thin then squeezed,
a compressed existence between departure and arrival.
I watch the world shrink,
rivers like stray veins,
highways like scars healing on the earth’s skin.
The sky is too large to hold a thought.
I land still hungry for the road.

(Second Movement: The Rails & the Spine)

The train hums in my vertebrae,
a lullaby of inertia,
a slow-motion dirge for impatience.
Out the window, fields unravel—
green whispers, brown exclamations,
occasional punctuation of telephone poles.
I sit beside a woman who knits silence,
a man who sips history from a thermos.
Somewhere, the whistle wails like a ghost remembering home.

(Third Movement: The Drunken Waltz of the Bus)

A bus is a confessional booth on wheels,
stories poured into cracked vinyl seats,
grumbling tires chewing on insomnia.
A child stares at me with eyes that know
more than they should,
and I wonder if my face is a mirror.
The driver is a poet of motion,
whispering curses at the red lights,
singing praise to the green.

(Fourth Movement: The Engine’s Soliloquy)

The car offers solitude,
a capsule of selfhood speeding past blurred towns.
I pull into gas stations like a pilgrim at an altar,
worshipping the god of combustion,
paying tithes in rupees and fumes.
Somewhere in the glove compartment,
I find a napkin with an old love note—
its ink smudged like a memory too soft to hold.

(Fifth Movement: The Bike’s Gospel)

Then, the final movement—
two wheels, one heartbeat.
Legs are metronomes, keeping time with the road.
Breath becomes wind, sweat becomes ink,
each push forward a word in an unfinished poem.
No windows, no walls, just
me and the breathing horizon.
This is the slowest way to arrive,
and the only way to truly be.

III. The Arrival That Never Arrives

In the end, there is no end.
A journey is a Möbius strip—
every road folds into another,
every departure seeds another return.
I arrive at a place only to find
the road stretching, yawning, calling my name.

So, what do I choose?
The airplane, the train, the bus, the car, the bike?

All.
None.
The journey itself, forever unspooling.

A road without a map.
A song without an end.

#Poetry #RoadTrip #JourneyWithoutEnd #PoeticMotion #WheelsAndWings #UnscriptedTravel #NomadicSoul