The Fifty-Cent Passport

The spine is cracked and the glue is dry.

For two quarters I bought the Nagano peaks

printed on paper that feels like a Tuesday

in a life I’ll never actually lead.

There is a ring of brown on the fold

where a stranger set down a mug.

They were looking at the same map,

maybe planning a train to the north

while the sun hit their kitchen wall.

Now I’m the one tracing the blue ink lines,

my thumb over mountains I’ll never climb.

The grain of the page is the only grit I get

from a country that doesn't know I'm here.