Lanes

On my way to work

There’s a road

With two lanes

Now, there’s nothing on

The right side of the road

No homes, no businesses

Nothing

And on the left side of the road

Is everything you can imagine

Restaurants, stores

Shopping plazas

And my job is at the end of the street

Right before it turns onto Hapley

Then down into Scoville proper

So here’s my daily predicament—

Do I stay in the right lane

Meaning—the slow lane

And not get to work

As briskly as I could

In the left

Provided—

--And this is a big provided—

Provided that nobody in the left lane

Is looking to make one of those deadly left turns

Into one of those many attractive parking lots

Leading to all kinds of wonderful things

Because, you see, if you try to make a left turn

You’re going to be sitting for awhile

Waiting for somebody to let you go

Because there aren't any green arrows
On any of the stoplights
On that road

It's all about
Who's willing
To let you go

It amazes me

That so many traffic laws

Still depend upon

The kindness

Of strangers

The point is

If I’m lucky—

And I have been lucky

From time to time—

If I’m lucky

I get into the left lane

And everybody else in the left lane--

Everybody ahead of me, I mean

Is in the same boat as me

They’re all going down

To the end of the road

Either to where I work

At Scoville Trust

Or they need to get to Hapley

And Scoville Proper

So we’re all going along

At a nice clip

A responsible

But well-paced clip

And I get to work

In no time

But as you can imagine

That’s a gamble

Because usually

When I get in the left-hand lane

Somebody decides to throw on their turn signal

And make a left

And that means I’m going to be stuck behind them

For awhile

Because once you choose a lane

You’re in that lane

That road’s too busy

To try moving over

You’ll get in an accident

Sure as you’re born

And, of course, moving over

Would be pointless anyway

Because as soon as you move over

That’s when the car in front of you

Makes the left-hand turn

And so you moved for nothing

You put your life on the line

For no reason at all

Just because you’re mad

That you tried going in the left-hand lane

To begin with

When you should have just stayed in the right-hand lane

Going along a little slower

But knowing there weren’t going to be any interruptions

Because there’s nothing on

The right-hand side of the road

So usually

That’s what I do

I trudge down the right-hand lane

And I look over at the left-hand lane

And usually I see people stuck behind somebody

Making a left-hand turn
And I feel kind of vindicated

About my choice

To live in the right lane

But sometimes

I see somebody

Coasting down the left-hand lane

Nobody else in sight

And I envy that person
I envy the hell out of them

I wonder if maybe I should be more like that person

Try the left lane a little bit more

Walk on the wild side

That kind of thing

And somewhere in all that

There’s a metaphor for life

I don’t know what it is

But I’m sure it’s there

Maybe you can figure it out

If you have the time

But me?

I gotta get

To work