The Morris Minor Poem by David Cooke

A lustreless
black, it slept all night
in a shed with the relics

of a different era:
a crumbling harness,
broken tools, a horseshoe

nailed to the wall -
then gargled to life
on busy mornings

when we drove
into town or to Mass.
Down the lane

the old man nudged it
as it lurched on
wrecked suspension,

its bodywork
strafed by brambles,
until at last

he coaxed it out
onto the open road;
and all those trips

we made in convoy
across that rambling landscape:
Enniscrone, Pontoon and back.

So many kids
and so much lumber -
the whole bloody tackle!