The Writer's Voice
The World's Favourite Literary Website
Boy In A Box
By
Rusty Broadspear
Five in the morning, I lay curled in my box
At the side of some road somewhere.
I heard nature yawning and scratching its derriere,
The first of many pollution peddlers zipped by.
I like the mornings,
The Sun felt hot on my box.
I was sleepy, so I pulled off the road.
Rubbing my eyes, up ahead was a box,
A boy, about mid teens, crawled out.
Camouflage coat, worn blue jeans,
Tanned face topped with yellow hair.
“What’s this kid doing there?”
I took off my coat and folded my box
And crossed the road to a car that had stopped.
The driver in his forties with shirt and tie
Looked like he’d just been rubbing his eyes.
“I want a lift to wherever you’re going.”
He let me in and only then did I chill.
His coat and box on the back seat
I looked down at sandals on his feet.
I was about to turn the key
When it attacked me tight across the chest
Pains down my right,
I silently screamed as I lost the fight.
I saw the sweat popping through his furrowed brow
And knew the time was now.
I reached for his hand and
Silently said, “You must go home”
“You will never have this pain again.”
I left him slumped against his side window.
I was glad I had stopped, I awoke refreshed.
As I pulled out I saw a hitchhiker
Climb in a 4 x 4 and join a young family.
It brought back the weirdest dream.
A dream I could never tell
Because as Bishop of this Parish
It scares me to Hell.
I don’t like evenings, the closing page of a day,
But then the job is done and who am I to say?
Critique this work
Click on the book to leave a comment about this work
