Issue 16
Road
Laura McMahon
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Fifteen Flashbacks
Halfway home,
I idle
before the interminable traffic signal.
Thunderclouds lower,
tower in tornado slate
beyond a house still
awash in sun; anachronistic
Christmas lights in May,
bits of glass fringe strung
below the roof shakes
swing and sparkle, transparent
as a '70s smiley face.
A flash -- magnification
of tinkling, impotent zigzags
sizzles in blinding bluewhite.
Years pass
before the green light says go;
I turn north
to a superimposed rainbow,
the idyllic symbol we stuck
on notebooks.
Cotton candy clouds muffle
the ends, nestled among hang ten,
peace signs.
I wheedled Dad his green Ford Courier,
in my tube top tan,
its homemade wood camper impossible
to view through. Failed the test in driving
rain, mood rings flashing prismal,
fickle as fish scales.
From parkway to driveway --
I steel myself for another flash
of fifteen. Real,
this time.
My red-haired daughter,
milkwhite skin flushing mercurial,
a fragile poise, posed. She tires
of being transported.
"Mom, the DMV. NOW."
I am not permitted
to stall.
But freedom = accidents.
I'll have to prize her
from the wreckage, along
with the notebook:
white on black etchings,
dark cartoons --
no dorky flower power here,
though a New Beetle contains her future
flashbacks.
~Laura McMahon
Laura McMahon lives in Oregon and has published poetry online in
Jackhammer, Utmost, and The Green Tricycle, Issue 15. Email.
© 2004 by Laura McMahon. All Rights Reserved.
© Copyright 2004 by Cayuse Press. All Rights Reserved.