This evening on the motorcycle

Poem XVIII - after Rosemary Tonks

Károly Kernstok, Evening Work (source)

This evening on the motorcycle, skirling
up Bingham Hill in bokeh, meandering
down to kelly pasture, tumbling
into the vale, sun like spoor
on the ridge, a bug spattered red
on the windscreen—

have you ever seen
what you should not see, said
a silent thing, flung a door
dreamt the cold water mumbling
through switchgrass, rouge pandering
to revolution, tall earth headlong purling

in grief?
In brief—

I rode home
under a sliver moon
like a gashed balloon
I rode home.