iPod Drive Night

You're driving in the night
miss turnings you're so tired
and have to swing across the 25
slip roading, adding twenty miles
but she's beside you, linking you
her music in your nearest ear
her bud blooming white, herself
strongly.

This is sharing now, her thumb
spinning, intro after intro
blending in your head, this is what
it sounds like to be her.

You need to make the most of this,
you tell yourself as each light
looms and fades, passing over
orange in the gloom, dipped in mist
and you think how you left her
chasing some dream half across the world
startled to look down on chains
of city streets like beads of light
spiders webs - breathtaking.

This, this! she says, you'll like it
and tarmac feeds miles beneath your wheels
coming on, getting somewhere - leaving
so much and all those mistakes - behind.