Words

Overpass Songs

I have this romantic vision stored away that pops up from time to time and it most often is triggered by a particularly ecstatic burst of melancholy. Yknow, the mindfuck moments where you have no idea if you’re smiling or about to cry. My vision is less of a vision and more of a memory that I have come to use as an archetype, as if words fail me but this one snapshot of a memory has the power to explain this deep awareness I suddenly feel. 


The wind bites a little, the kind that pulls a little at your hoodie and makes you dig your fingers deeper into your pockets. It’s around five thirty on a winter night and the sky is in full force in an ombre watercolor that starts out around navy and drips down into pale sunset orange. The streetlights are on but not quite necessary and headphone cords dangle down from your collarbones. Looking up into the sky makes the breath a little colder and every step taken is one less you have left. Though the warm home waiting for you is an enticing destination, you’re not particularly looking forward to the walk being over. 


In the days when I wore that bittersweet melancholy wrapped around my shoulders, with me constantly, I found intense beauty in the overpass I walked under on my walks home. The lack of light turned the architectural beast into a thing of mystery, a device of advanced technology shrouded in the fog of the unknown. Tall shadows cast onto the sidewalk in the shape of chainlink fences painted my path as I lifted cheap WalMart work shoes one after the other. 


Pondering the deepest and most mundane thoughts my stream of consciousness has to offer, the stars line up suddenly as my iPod starts the next song which promptly stops me in my tracks. Strains of melody drift straight up through my brain and into my bloodstream. The overpass and I, beings of depth in the dusk.