Road Kill

 

(Temagami, Ontario, Canada.  September 2004.)

 

Neil Harding McAlister

  

It takes a hard-nosed kind of man

To drive trucks in this northern land.

I’m not the sentimental type.

I do my job as best I can.

The long way round is not for me:

Just draw a line from A to B.

High-milers take the scenic route,

But pavement’s mostly what I see.

 

Past rocks, by frozen lakes serene,

Down corridors of evergreen,

There’s danger in the scenery.

You dare not sightsee, dare not dream.

A friend of mine was killed last year              

When, late one night, he hit a deer.

Did inattention cost his life?

To stay alive, best live with fear.

 

The sun was shining overhead

One day last fall, when far ahead

I saw some movement on the road –

A rabbit, hurt but not quite dead

Lay thrashing in the other lane,

A mangled lump of sickening pain,

His hind legs squashed into a pulp.

He wasn’t going to run again.

 

In younger days I used to fight

At Mackey’s Gym on Friday nights.

I’ve seen my share of blood and puke

While punching out some sucker’s lights.

Out hunting, I don’t really care

When I have shot a moose or bear;

But it was more than I could stand

To see that rabbit suffer there.

 

That was a road I often take:

I knew a turnout by a lake.

I pulled my rig off to the side.

As, gearing down, I hit the brake,

The diesel’s angry, rattling sound

Rang through the forest all around.

The big truck thundered to a stop.

I paused -- then doubled back my ground,                 

 

Retracing fifteen clicks I’d come.

Some dirty business left undone

By someone else, now far away,

Lay bleeding in the morning sun.

I found that bunny presently --

And not a pretty sight to see.

I floored the pedal, turned the wheel,

And stopped the creature’s misery.

 

We win some; but at last we’ll lose.                          

Too bad a trucker cannot choose       

If he will slowly fade away   

Or end up in tomorrow’s news.    

But I’d hope, if life struck me down

And left me crippled on the ground,

There’d come a crushing, knockout blow

To end this fighter’s final round.

 

 

 

High-miler --  trucker’s word for a driver who takes a longer, more scenic route, rather than the shortest, most direct road between two points.

 

Clicks  --  Canadian slang for “kilometers.”

 

  

 © NHMcA, 2004