my three wheeler is blue with some yellow too

by Angus Strachan

i pedal for miles and miles
looking for other children
my head hurts so much and cement is grey
and i must find some children to play with
or become that cement
somehow my older sister is hiding
in a shoe box inside a cupboard
in the bottom of a wishing well
all crunched up below the sea but not me
why my mother never thought
of looking for her there is a mystery i think
my sister is tops but she doesn’t talk much
but i can’t think about this now
as i wake up and jump out of bed
it’s time for kings of the road
first i have to yawn

mother’s struggle with their daughters
more than their sons
nanna said to aunty pat
who we never see anymore
because there’d been a war
which means no more cousin becky for me
mother is good at that
on a hair trigger says mrs. albert from next door

none of this matters right now
i finish my yawn and i’m raring to
get out on the track
with my yellow and blue hellcat
holy cow i’m breaking
the donald campbell land speed record
screaming out our side gate rat-a-tat
that poor man sure has met his match
when i step on the gas at twilight
before anyone else is awake
it’s dark and the stars are just starting to say
goodbye and the shadows whisper to the moon
i might climb every tree for ten city blocks
the leaves never sleep they just shake and say
how are you then sigh as i ride away
maybe every road and lane once then twice and this morn
i’m racing my trike down the middle of st kilda road
even now there are early birds like me
and they swerve holy-jimminy
they’ve never seen a monster three wheeler before
in the middle of their busy road not at 4am
until a police car sees me and goes flashing red
and the race is on for the quick and the dead
i rev her up with a wheelie or two
like zorro with his horse except on my bike
it’s easy for me to get away
i know every hole in every fence
every narrow alleyway
and now i’m home
puffing rocks and boulders again
when i should be playing tag
or war or countries & kings
with other children just like me
i must have done something really bad
and i’m about to fall down the well
where my sister has set up home
when suddenly
an older boy comes from lickety-split nowhere
pops out a crack from the midnight breeze
he has a bit of a moustache
he’s big and maybe a little bit sad
all he does is stare at the wind
i’m sure i’ve seen him before
i think he was the one at aunt daisy’s foster care
who had the big log and chased them all
when they did things to me
but like my sister living under the sea
i think he is a little bit fog-lost and dreamy
but he’s not nearly as strange
as the twins who step right through a wall
they are joined at the waist and not very tall
and they never stop yakking but not to me
holy jimminy-hellcats those two can talk
says mister moustache staring through the breakfast sky
and suddenly i realize
i was begging the air and the cement for friends
and here they are
so it’s either cement
or them

Angus Strachan
May 2020

Image by Cinzia Fabrizio