the best road trip in America

soaring through nature’s finest show.
Denali, the great one, soaring under the midnight sun.
And then the extremes. In the winter time
it’s the frozen road
that is competing
with the view of ice fogged frigid beauty,
the cold though, doesn’t it split
the Cheechakos from the Sourdoughs?
And then in the summertime such extreme
summertime
about a hundred and fifty degrees hotter
than just some months ago,
than
just some months from now,
with fireweed blooming
along the frost heaves
and merciless rivers
that are rushing
and carving
and reminding us
that here,
Mother Nature wins.
It is
as throughout all Alaska
that big wild
good life
teeming along the road
that is north
to the future.

- Sarah Palin, excerpt from Resignation Speech, Sunday July 26, 3pm Alaska time

See the William Shatner performance here. Thanks Alex for the heads up.