i was 10 when i fell in love with a man on a black horse whose name was motion. before that, i was stationary in quasi-suburbia, but after, i could not stay still. and of course i still lived with my parents, not yet industrious enough to run away. once we stayed a whole three years and i grew sick with longing for my lover. i caught the tiniest glimpses of him, when my mom had fallen asleep and i ran off down college way, but that was never enough. i wanted him to lift me onto the back of his horse the way he'd done when i was so young, and carry me down every road he knew and lots he didn't.

my dad was almost always in the same place, but when he got sick of me, he pushed me harshly away, back to my love. i found that when i was bad, i got to spend all day in his arms, as no one would have me and it was impossible to know where i would wake up the next morning. and so i was worse. i got wheels, and i flew away to seattle or eugene or canada to visit him. he rode with me down highway 11 every windy fall night on the way back from work.

in my eighteenth summer, we eloped. he carried me away to the other coast, with my veil trailing like a banner. and he left. left me in a tomb with no windows save one looking out into hell. i could not write and beg him to come back. i could speak to him through others, when i followed their schedules and i may as well have been a crate of perishables shipped up and down and across new england. months later, i saw him in new york city, and he kissed me quickly before disappearing into the hum of the subway.

finally i returned to my parents, beaten. my father had a letter for me, and it was from him, and he was dead. he wrote from his hospital bed to say he knew what i didn't, and i looked down at the strange slope of my belly and knew it was true. i would not be carried anymore, run just to run. i would be decisive and choose to go, stay when it was necessary and not kick down walls to feel the wind in my face.

i had motion's child and it was truly mine. and i brought it here, and will stay as long as i must. and then me and my child will buy a black horse and lose ourselves where the land and the sky are flat as infinity. but my baby will always be mine, and i will never go home in the same way i did when i was nine.