Long Day's Journey

We're driving to Canberra
for the second time in twenty years.

Who are the two strangers
in the back seat of the car?

Where did they come from?
They weren't there last time.

I look at the road swooping
around the hill and over the bridge.

Our children are two potent presences
pressing us forward. They are so like

people they might almost be people.
Spewed out of our bodies.

As I hold my breath the man
in the driver's seat in so short a time

thrums us around the hill and over the bridge.
And my God, we are there.