Vacationers

All our passports have expired.
I stack them at one end of the table
in plain view, a reminder to fill out 
reapplication forms. When and why 
did this become such a procedure, 
for those who truly have nothing 
to declare? Last spring we wanted to buy 
tickets for a train that goes nowhere except 
around the foothills, starting from some town 
in Virginia. Just as the trees began to stipple 
with color, you might sit and look out of clear 
picture windows, drink champagne and bite 
into triangles of cheese while listening to a tour 
guide narrate history. All this as if to say, why 
should the destination always be about place? 
There's still that deeper country to explore,
the one we carry with us everywhee we go.