Can I Drive By Your House?

Can I drive by your house?

The house where you used to live

You don’t live anywhere now

Not that I know of

Not that I’m aware of

Can I drive by your house

After leaving a bar

On a Tuesday night

And park the car

And turn off the lights
And sit on the side of the road

Wondering who’s living behind

Your windows now?

Can I sit and wallow
Just wallow

While I chew my gum
So I don’t bite my nails off

While I listen to songs

That weren’t around
When I knew you

But which I’m sure

You would’ve liked

As I let the engine clear its throat a few times

Telling me to get on with my night

That I have work tomorrow

That I have places to be

And this house is not your house

And the car parked in your spot

Is not new or owned by you

And that it’s pretty likely

Every single thing

Now sitting inside that house

Has never

And will never

Belong to you

Can I watch cars go by

And wonder where they’re going
And how long it will take them to get there

And whether it’s home

Or the home of someone else

They used to have around

What if we all drove

To someone else’s house

Right now?

The person that moved

The person that left

The person that stopped calling

The person we stopped calling

The person who could still be there

But we’re just not sure

The person we know

Isn’t there

Anymore

What if we all sat outside

Those homes

Those apartment buildings

Those condos

Those places

Sat in our cars
And our taxis
On our bikes

On the ground

Looking at where we used to go

And try to remember

The first time

We went there

After we realized

That behind that door

Was someone we loved

Remember the way

We pulled up

With the radio playing

A song about love

Where the music dropped out

Right before the second-to-last chorus

And we went through the door

Like we were walking into forever

The rest of our lives

Among those rugs

And that furniture

And that person

Who lived there

And knew us

Back before needed to drive by an old house

To remember

Who we were

That person cooked for us

And talked to us

And made us laugh
And watched tv with us

And gave us a place in the world

To be someone

We couldn’t be

Anywhere else

And imagine if everyone

Who lived inside those places now

Opened their doors

And said—‘Come in’

Imagine if they let us

Walk through those rooms

And touch those walls
And sit down on the floor

And try to get back

Some of what we had
Back then

What if some of that person

Was left behind

In the air

Or the carpet

Or the electrowaves

Or the peeling wallpaper

Or the wifi

Or the wood splinters

Could we know that?

Could we—?

If the world were a place

Where doors were always open
And you knew where people went

And nobody was too far away

Or gone for too long?

Those are impossible questions

With invisible answers

For now, I’m just wondering—

Can I drive by your house?

And think—

I used to know someone here

I used to have

A place

To go