Staring at light green painted walls
adorned with maps of Alaska
nostalgia creeps within my fingertips
and like exposed light free of dust, pure
it permeates any wall I have erected
and hits my heart.

I see the places I have not seen.

I taste the earth I have not touched.

I breath the air I long for.

Color coded, lines of various widths,
thin gray lines showing height and topography,
massive bodies of water, cities, towns, settlements,
corporations, landingstrips, public and private land,
and the few highways cutting the Alaskan pie
into manageable slices.

A few years ago I set a goal
to visit each slice until
I consumed the whole of this
mysterious place.

I trace the contours of where I have been.

I wonder the thoughts verging on obsession.

I trace the recent tattoo “Namaste”
– the spirit within me, bows to the spirit within you –
and I further wonder, was this the last word spoken
by the last frontier?