Wanderlust

There is a yearning deep in my bones

to see lands far from home;

to sleep under a different sky;

to smell strange aromas upon the wind;

and to just be places I've never been.

Don't tie me down to just one place

for I need to feel the desert on my face.

I need to climb up mountains, rocks, and crags

and walk the plains through and endless sea of grass.

Why? It's just who I am - I don't ask.

Once, I'd have been a mountain man

or perhaps led wagon teams west in caravan.

In a future not revealed, I'll pilot starships

across the vast gulf between planets and stars.

I now live in a world explored, yet my wanderlust takes me far.

by Troy Hibbitts, March 1997