What Does It Mean to Travel - Mary Chapin Carpenter

From departure to arrival

What does it mean to travel

With your suitcase by the handle

Holding everything you need

Are you going or are you coming

Walking slow or running

Toward somebody or from something

Trade your longing in for speed

And the freedom to be a stranger

Is a bargain that’s ours alone

Sometimes you just want to be someone else

Unencumbered and unknown

From departure to arrival

What does it mean to travel

And from taking off to landing

You could feel your heart expanding

You walked halfway down Manhattan

Till you met the Brooklyn Bridge

And in a 2 AM transmission

From a high wire act position

How the skyline behind you glistened

As if someone pulled a switch

And I don’t want to be a stranger

And I don’t want to be alone

But sometimes I just want to be somewhere else

Untethered and unknown

When I am far from home

From departure to arrival

What does it mean to travel