Skullsmashed Mountain Road

Spirits at Lighthouses Contest ▼

https://www.writing.com/main/forums/item_id/2128856-Spirits-at-Lighthouses-Conte...

Image 2277773 On a Mountain Road{/linespace

A poem to read aloud when the campfire dims and night encroaches.

The twisted road down Skullsmashed Mountain
Winds through forests thick with spruce
A narrow, dark and dismal tunnel
Even on the brightest days.

I'm loathe to drive that tortuous highway
Murked with mist and filled with fog
Hidden turns and lurking dangers
Wait to catch me unaware.

Yet go I must, so blind I travel
Down that dark and daunting road
Head- and fog-lights all but useless
Feeble in the ghastly gloom.

The waxing moon, first quarter rising
Looms above, a lurid blight
Yet on that dark and twisted highway
Sheds not the slightest bit of light.

Around a bend then, to my terror,
A pair of cyclists in my path
Too late I brace and brake in panic
A double impact chills my soul.

I stop and leap onto the mountain
Staring wildly all about
No sign at all of bikes or bodies
All is calm and deadly still.

In my bumper, dents and scratches
On my hood a spray of black
That must be blood from deadly contact
Fading even as I watch.

The scratches on my bumper vanish
Dents re-form and smooth themselves
My breathing finally slows to normal
My racing heart at last relents.

Against the car I lean, and wonder
What was real and what was not?
Who was killed, and when, and how,
To haunt the Skullsmashed road.

The twisted road down Skullsmashed Mountain
Winds through forests thick with spruce
A narrow, dark and dismal tunnel
Hiding secrets all the way.