Wing Furl

by

Thomas Michael McDade

Returning from a wake
I'm speeding
and don't know whether
I'm trying to outrun death
or just don't see the point
of caution anymore
since death's so simple
old men do it in a snap.
The highway's a conveyor belt,
street lamps are mantis heads,
wings furled tightly
in disgust.
They know the wakes I've missed;
the ones I've used to see old friends.
Caffeine interferes when I try to pray
but I'm able to feed the cassette player
my favorite tapes as reverently
as Christmas or Easter hosts.
I dedicate the songs
to everyone, but especially
those who've sinned like me.
The music twitches corpses
and sleeping folk
are bolted upright like Lazarus.
The road's a stretch
of audio tape my tires caress
like heads unpaving every tune
that ever was, for every soul
who did or did not sing.
Christ knows I'm going too fast
but I need the speed of light
to outwit mantises whose weather
beaten wings threaten to unfurl
and wrap around me
like newspapers that didn't warm
a drifter sacked out
in a junkyard car--
my obit the last thing
he ever saw.

NEXT?
Why don't you look at courage
by: Dan O Connor
from: Dublin, Ireland

To visit all of Thomas Michael McDade's poems, click HERE

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