When the speed demons come,
Racing around us in their angry little cars
Weaving through the stodgy law-abiding
Three lanes of citizens obediently blinking to pass
For fear of being stopped by a patrol car,
We / I feel like an ant among ants
Creeping along the vein of a leaf
Though a future-petrified swamp.
I thank the many gods of
Our nameless numbered highways
That these newly hatched nymphs
Do not devour us alive. Thank god they are
Just obsessed with tearing up the highway
And that to them we are just obstacles.
In the back of my mind of course
Is my far greater dread
Of the last stage of their metamorphosis.
We have all seen the adults,
Meganeuropsis permians,
Prowling the skies, wings ablur
Heading for the war counsels,
Those top secret meetings
Where our fates are decided.
.............
In this poem I am venting my feelings, the feelings that roar through me that I stuff every time one of those little sh*t cars or two or three careen past the rest of us on the interstate. They are always small because they have to maneuver around us to play their game of high stakes. A friend was explaining to me what he learned from a conversation with a state trooper at a cookout when the trooper was off-duty. He admitted, they don't generally chase speedsters anymore unless there was a suspected crime committed and even then, not always, because high speed chases endanger innocent bystanders. Duhh. I was never a fan of high speed chases, which always reminded me of the old silent films with the cops chasing the bad guys to a rambunctious piano score where anything goes. But what is happening on the highways with these speedsters playing chicken in our midst, while we are just trying to get somewhere in one piece, isn't a movie, but it is a little like living in the Wild West and although I am not a fan of law and order on steroids I am a little worried that the future is going to written by crazies who think that life is nothing but a damn game.
(Article changed on Apr 16, 2024 at 9:47 AM EDT)
