This Morning

Dark and silent only broken by a soft rumble

and the telltale sound of gears

expertly manipulated on quiet streets. 

A rumble interrupted at stop signs

whose stern message I observe halfheartedly

in tamed and mindless obedience to the letter of the law. 

Tires on gravely blacktop crunch through sleepy neighborhoods

and hot coffee gingerly sipped through a spill proof lid

washes my teeth in their morning brown. 

Headlights on reflective paint and unlit rooms behind shop glass

show me only the yellow wavering eyes of my transport as I glide through,

an approaching harmless growl quickly passing. 

Bundles of dwellings with windows softly lit

by the unobtrusive lamps of breakfast blur

into the fading dark in side view as my wheels roll ever slower

with unliving familiarity towards my entry point to the highway. 

Here I negotiate with barely a thought through hurling distracted death

and plunge safely into the relentlessly sputtering stream of early risers. 

I pilot my sanctuary into disciplined step

with the first few to whom my fate is so anonymously intertwined

as together we ride the ebb and flow of our communal vein of light to our destinations. 

Largely motionless inside my bubble of metal and controlled explosions

I watch the rise and swell of the rolling hills passing beneath me,

and guide with tempered hand my weaving dance around the maypole of commuters. 

White fences draw their ghostly crooked lines across my windows

as the  darkness above speeds westward,

chased by long low lines of color which bubble from the vibrating horizon in my rear view. 

Subtle hues of red slowly begins to saturate the world around me,

condensing in tiny pools which pry obscure shapes from the background,

forming them into farmhouses and sheds, mailboxes and off-center hand-painted signs.

More colors draw strength from reds boldness and spread

with growing confidence across the land and sky. 

At last, even as I watch,

heralded by the march of a humble but persistent army of color and light

the triumphant glowing forehead of the sun breaches the earth

and drives the last bits of darkness to cower in shivering formation behind miles of fence posts. 

TSN