The speaker recalls getting lost one evening in a New Jersey housing development, where the winding lanes and identical houses offered no landmarks. This was before phone maps, so there was nothing to rely on. Then she remembers that her house lies east and north, rolls down the window, looks up at the stars, and finds her way home "like an ancient mariner."
The last stanza turns wry. She lists everything a doomsday prepper might stock: water, canned food, guns, candles, even an ox and plow. She has none of it. All she has is a sense of direction. The tone is gently humorous and a little self-mocking, yet it holds real affection for a skill that feels both tiny and ancient. The mood is calm and quietly wondering. The poem suggests that modern life may leave us unprepared, but looking up at the sky still connects us to old human knowledge, and that may be enough to get us home.