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Sonnets From Other Lives: Dale

Driving down the west slope of the pass,
he imagined he could smell the ocean.
Recent rain gave the highway a glass-
like sheen & a familiar emotion—
what was it? The opposite on longing…
Nearly nostalgia… Did it have a name?
Maybe it’s a feeling of belonging—
having left the dry land wheat & sage
to return to where mosses & evergreens
glowered on the ridges. It had been
six or seven months since he had seen
her. Would things start up again
where they left off when he left her & went east
to go to school? He couldn’t wait to see.