Nomadic Death | Poem
Article voiceover
It’s 4:15 (4:15!) and the sun is setting. There are no streetlights here. The earth is dark black despite white snow all around. Light didn’t make it here, just quit somewhere in the heavens. High, high up, in the corner of the atmosphere is perpetual dawn, a subtle blue on the ceiling of this city’s firmament. The light is so far gone my own eye-lid is hidden to me, yet perpetual dawn glows on, some atmospheric mirage in the vast Canadian distance. This is one scene from many on the road. The employer buys you onto a plane, then a connection, a rental, a room, an entire week of travel, spat out wherever you wind up. Modern conveniences like internet and mobile computing have made it possible to travel back, virtually, instantly, from wherever you are. Except virtual meetings don’t connect from the fuselage. Spreadsheets must be stowed through security. Messages do not disturb when the client has paid their tens of thousands to be with you, right then, at this very time. At that time, only one thought survives: “I am here.” Where I am not, I am not. The nomad learns, the nomad is taught, the nomad realizes the impossibility and folly of maintaining what is left behind. Everyone thinks they can take it with them, especially those who never leave, until they learn, through leaving, they cannot. They leave and what they leave is dead to them, and to them they are dead to what they leave. The nomad knows no familiarities, accounts no possessions, grieves no relationship, expects no tomorrow, remembers no yesterday. They are free, totally owned by their present experience, dutiful only to the now with no expectancy of its end or beginning. There is no shelf to rest upon, no destination to arrive upon, just an ever-ending current of the sea. It is only upon a nomad’s return that they realize how deceptive settler life can be, that we take our responsibilities so seriously, accounting for the home, for the family, the business, the governance, the marketplace, the church, and the many calendar commitments politely sequencing time. We assume ruin if we don’t prescribe perfectly to all the tasks, rules, and maintenance. But the nomad learns surrendering duty is duty. It’s 4:15 (this time, in the morning), and I woke up this morning knowing I only had time to pack my bags and make my flight, moving through security knowing I only had time to move through security, sitting on the plane knowing I only had time to sit on the plane, arriving home, knowing I only had time to arrive home, leaving again, knowing I only had time to leave ... and having no time I was free of it. Unable to keep it, I let go.