Never one for the road

I was never one for the road you know.
No rising tarmac heat,
or rover-beat of feet as distance walked.
Yet talked as the day ends to
friends who danced to lands,
shook hands, never once looked back.

Yet I was never one for the road you see,
the one left behind by the pied piped dreams.
Still hear a far off pan note
through a ruptured ear
and my heart though restless
can never hit the road.

This my dust-bed;
a red clay path, at the edge of the town.
Eyes cast down
until at a last utter street,
I can go no further.

Your well-worn faces cared
for me but travellers took their arms
from concrete crippled shoulders,
took the road, leaving me a godless orphan,
a drifting waif, and never one for the road.

I waited on the stunt-bike mound
body bruised on ground.
A foster child of tyre marked track
when's my comfort coming back?
Courage failed.
Spirit lost, the cost of letting people touch
and rub the hurt flash away.

Temporal though real
steal my hard and steely shell
as well as rendering me a frightened prisoner
of no-man's land.

Drifter's all abandonment.
Itchy hearts and reckless road roams.
I hope in days to come you remember me,
the one too weak for the road.

So if you took the road, you see,
A rootless time of roving,
waiting on the bridge,
to stare at skies and many roads,
(all lead away), this urban angel waits for you
this last place of light.

For they're all out there. Where?
The world has many places
outside my blind and naked mind,
I coast, wander wide and wonder
if you're coming back to watch my journey.

For I was never one for the road.