Exit 9

31 October 2026

I take the exit marked nothing,the one with a number no one bothers to remember,because the road doesn't care where I'm going,it only keeps opening.

Three in the morning, the gas station sits therelit up like it's waiting for someone in particular.I buy a coffee I know I won't finishand fold the map wrong on purpose,so the creases don't match anybody's route.

A deer stands at the shoulder,not running, not grazing,just deciding.I ease off the gas. I understand her completely.

I am not lost. I know exactly where I am:forty-one miles from a town I invented,pointed at a horizonthat keeps selling itself a little furtherevery time I get close.

Somewhere behind me, a bedstill holds the shape I left in it.Somewhere ahead, a gas stationI haven't picked yet.

I keep my foot steady on the pedallike the going is the arriving,like enough miles might finallyadd up to somewhere.

Full page, with the responses

Leave a reading

Readings are written by members — free, and the poem stays right here while you write.

New here? Create an account — it takes a minute.

Readings so far (1)

Soren Vance1 November 2026

"Not running, not grazing, just deciding" might be the exact center of this poem, and you let it stand there unexplained. I half expected "the going is the arriving" to slip into sentiment, but by then you'd earned it, so it holds. There's an impulsiveness running through this that isn't how I'd move through a poem, but I trust it completely by the end.