"No Dust Follows" Leaving Boise behind commemoration poem (Originally written 7/2/25) by Kevin Wikse

I struggled with how I felt about leaving Boise after living there once more for an extended period of time, and truth be told, I hope for the last time. Familiarity breeds contempt, and I had become far too acquainted with the "City of Trees" to feign politeness for much longer. The thing was, I didn’t want to resent or despise the people, the city, or my time there as I had previously. That weighed on me.

I knew coming back to Boise from South Tucson would only be temporary, although at the time I had not yet made any concrete plans, even if I was zeroing in on Northern California. I wanted the opportunity to say what I needed to say, do what I needed to do, and walk away from a place, a city, a people, a culture, and a collective hub of stifling ideology, and not feel pieces of me missing. 

I can finally say I left Boise where, at least to me, it always belonged: in the dust. And none of it followed.

"No Dust Follows"

Boise lay behind me
like a dog turned to sleep in the yard,
its eyes half-lidded,
its teeth no longer for me.
The air was dry enough to crack prayers in two  
There were partings to make,
hands to shake without heat,
words said plain so they wouldn’t sour later.
I tied the loose ends like a cowboy knots a rope,
tight and without ceremony.
There’s no poetry in leaving done right.
Only a clean cut and the hollow ring of it after.
The road west unspooled under the tires.
The mountains swelled in the windshield.
Boise grew small,
then smaller still,
until it was only a shape in my mind
and then not even that.
I carried no rancor.
Not for the place.
Not for the faces.
I left the ghosts where they stood
and they did not follow.
Northern California waited
like a page I hadn’t yet read,
the kind that smells of rain on iron.
I drove on.

-Kevin Wikse