The Highway

Like scars along a jagged arm,

winding lanes evoke alarm.

Humming pods expel their fumes,

unaware that terrors loom.

Lurking there behind the wheel,

by chance or defect, twisted steel

incarcerates or ejects,

all the things meant to protect.

Extensions of the limbs and brain

make contact with man-made terrain.

Crusted sores keep nature back

as she heaves beneath the cracks.

Blacktop vessels pumping man

along an endless caravan,

may speed the growth of industry

but manipulate topography.

Like polyp roots lanes weave and grow,

dividing soils we used to know,

severing clans from grazing lands.

Forced to watch as it expands

creatures sit behind the rails,

guarding them like county jails.

The highway curls, rises and falls;

boring slowly through us all.