{ Liz Berry: Trucker's Mate. }

[delga]

Trucker’s Mate
by Liz Berry

The A1 is the loneliest. Four hundred
and nine miles down the spine of the country,
only the firefly of a fag tip to keep you steady.
A man needs some company,
an eye on the map, a hand on the radio.
Ten four, hammer down, breaker breaker.

He made a man of me, rubbed me
smooth with engine grease, taught me how
to pull a flatbed, take an unsigned route,
draw the curtains against the prying eyes
of headlights. As other lorries trundle home,
we push onwards, the road a romance.

I was a kid that first night. Birmingham
to Folkestone. The junctions looping
and racing above us, his hand on my leg.
In the woods beside the lay-by, I pressed my tongue
into the sap of a pine tree as I pissed;
already half in love with him.

Now belly to back in the cab, his vertebrae
like cat’s eyes guiding me down,
I think of the M6 Toll, lined with two million
pulped Mills & Boons; how love is buried
in unlooked for places, kept secret like us.
In the darkness his breath hums like an engine.

Comments

[twincy.livejournal.com]

Tore me to pieces & put me back together (though not quite the same as I was) as all good poetry should. ♥