No, no one's There Calling at Home

The traffic is usual and the path is far.
Lorries wham past, and roads are potholed.
Some rain has fallen, and so it slips.
My tyres, their tread gone, skid.

Crowded buses lunge,
And the bikes' beelines make a maze.
My brakes are weak. None can
hear my horns.

I have to whizz past.
No, no one’s there calling at home,
which is as empty as the roads here.

But I have to push the needle
to the speedometer's limit-
Perfect my cuts and smoothen my
drivethroughs-Knife through
the maze and be one with
the breeze. Beat time to a second's
section and find purpose.

A kind child's sorrow smile bloom up the sidewalk.
It’s a flicker of a look and a bump in my consciousness-
In the intersperse of a fishcart and a heading lorry,
and a waterslick on the road and brakes that fail.