When you drive on back roads
you develop a different
sense of direction, of place.
You know you’re in the South
by the trees, Spanish moss
hanging like heavy rain
and stealing the leaves
of smaller trees, and
all manner of things
hanging from or affixed
between trees, a tire swing,
something passing for a hammock
and endless clotheslines
announcing that here
the seasons are measured
by rainfall and temperatures
that rarely know freezing.