To the Tune of the Highway at Night

Not fifteen minutes from the depot I met the oldest man I've seen outside a home, at 93, in blue and white striped linen slacks. He sat with me and shook my hand.

I was off to friends in Pennsylvania; he was headed to Chicago, first time back in years and years, his first time back to find an infant son he'd buried there. He told me so himself when we had barely traded names. I asked him how he thought the world had changed since he was young, my age.

He coughed and spoke about the night his father shot down from a pine a young black bear, that fell among his five best dogs with ropes of drool all swinging from their mouths.