by Christy Parker

There’s a Castlemartyr traffic jam
Its thirty-five years old
It moves ten metres every year
And sometimes less, I’m told

It’s choc-a-bloc in gridlock shock
It’s time without a space
Kids have grown to angry men
Without seeing another place

There’s buses, lorries, bikes and cars
A horse-and-cart or two
Ten fire brigades can’t fight this Hades
Nor an ambulance get through

The man attired in the car in front
Is in a worried state
He left his house for his wedding day
In 1998

The driver in the hearse behind
Is disconsolate as well
He’s going to miss a funeral
Because he’s stuck in Hell

The couple cursing to my right
Had a family of four
They got stuck at the lights in ‘99
And now they have two more.

And six cars back a priest in black
Is ringing up the Pope,
He yells, “God’s intervention,
Is our only feckin’ hope!”

So I write ten poems and read twelve books
And I cope the best I can
As I pass three months with a plasterer
In his yellow transit van

The weeks go by, we watch our lives
Edge oh so slowly on
I want to get to Midleton
But my will to live is gone.

Christy Parker’s first collection of illustrated verse, ‘Don’t Step In The Poems‘ is now available locally. Price €9.95