Unsettled

Unsettled

I have a set of keys

To 900ft. of carpets and walls.

I know how many steps to the bathroom,

How many people fit in these halls,

But knowledge isn’t home.

I have a bedroom with my paper name on the door

In a house somewhere too far out.

In a place that smells like your cigarettes and perfume,

Where the air tastes like strangers and doubt.

Papers and names don’t make home.

I have a gas tank and four tires

New brakes, and a new transmission.

But she came used and already trained,

And she starts up without my permission.

Mechanics built her body but didn’t build a home.

I have a gypsy whim to abide by

And a youthfulness unwilling to settle.

I miss believing in something permanent

I’m a gypsy who is too attached to you:                                  

           I'm the present tense of cars and keys that came and went.