First Place: Andrea Dispo

destinesia

(noun) when you get to where
you were intending to go
but forget why you were going there
in the first place

Between the oily residue of night
market tables and the rickety steps
of the Hakone mountains,
a little bus station stands alone
in the fog. There are stars on the sides
of the road, desolate and still, burning

in the palm of my hand. I hold them

close to my chest. Tonight, the half moon
rises above the clouds, and somewhere
tucked away in the valleys of your heart
and mine, a train rumbles off into the distance.