Mending Car
After "Mending Wall" by Robert Frost.
Something there is that doesn't love a car,
That sends the frozen ruts heaving under it,
And splits the undercarriage with rock salt;
And makes rust holes no sticker can cover.
The work of drivers is another thing;
I have come after them and stopped quick
When they have paused for no reason,
But they would have a conversation there hiding,
To hear the squealing tires. The drivers I mean.
No-one admits errors or knows how they are made,
But at accident-time we find them there.
I stop short to avoid one on a hill
And on a night I fail to stop the car
And find myself carless once again.
We bring it home and to his car we go
To move the things we wish to move.
We fill the car with cats and boxes so high
We have to use a spell to let us see behind.
"No tailgaters while our backs are turned!"
We make our fingers cold on the steering wheel.
Oh, just another kind of outdoor game,
One on a side. Yet so much more.
His car is sturdy but mine is far newer.
Your car will last for many more miles
And outlast most built that year, I tell him.
He only says, "Good service makes happy cars."
Winter mischief comes to me, and I wonder
If I could put a notion in his head:
"Why do we need good service? Isn't it
To keep the engine happy? But your engine runs well.
Before I'd fix my car I'd ask to know
What value was kept up or kept down,
And from what danger it would protect.
Something there is that doesn't love a car,
That wants it dead!" I could say "Brakes!" to him,
But it's not brakes exactly, and I'd rather
Go to a mechanic. But we can wait,
Bringing my car to be fixed later in the month
While his car, like an old tank, goes on.
It moves in darkness as it seems to me,
Until he calls from the wintry shade of trees.
It will not go beyond its final resting.
And he tows it home to its final knell.
He says again, "Good service makes happy cars."
© 2001 Rachel S. Silverman