On and off the DGP Expressway

Some random snatch of talk, a stranger’s ring

flashes sporadic at rest on his steering
three-faced signals, shamelessly red-eyed
shove me roughly back behind the hopscotch wide
zebra stripes, sunlight drizzles through the trapeze
of cables and dazzling green leaf canopies.

 

A black-crow feather sails down the oceans

of blue skies and frozen peace, broken
strokes of cirrus clouds; so easy to confuse
for migratory bird-wings, and/or the ooze
of peppery smoke from faraway brick kilns
clay on fiery tongues, sky furred with smoke-films.



The strict culverts, the narrowing and  the strips
of sudden widths forge their own narratives
knead their own songs into soft mud, hard clay,
dark tarmac, rear wheel sand and gravel spray
the percussion of pebbles on membranes
thinned with the sounds of distant urban

 

The sky draws its pink fleece, a faded

blanket in one swift move from toes to top of head
the smoke plumes still keep up their dark contrast
till the sunset routine is flushed and done at last
the road now held tender in the palms
of darkness, cradled lullaby-soft in its arms.