Smell the Open Road
Gas tanks filled with spring water
After an evening rain
Burnt oil
Mixed with crisp dry grass
Exhaust, rubber, and leaves
Animal carcasses and skunks
A breeze off the mountain
The clatter of a loose strut
The smell of day old coffee
Cigarettes burnt and discarded
This is what the open road
Means
The smell of the iron factories
On the southern belt of lake Michigan
Bellowing smoke into the pale virgin air
Blowing through vents
Uninvited and black
The water air carries it slowly into the sky
As tires burn
Coal burns
Into the morning sky
To the mountains north of New York
The cities production
To leave the consumer with a knife and fork
These days on the road
Go long and slow
The smell of semi barreling down the road
Reminds me of black soot wrapped in burnt grass
With a wind swept freshness
This is the open road
And what it means to me
