Summer 23: 42, Toy Run, Fiona Sinclair

The youngster in lime leathers
on champing Kawasaki,
boasts immortality as bike and
biker become a roadblock, holding back
two snarling lanes of traffic.
So, we on this motorcycle run for charity
may pass like a fast-flowing river.
First time perhaps as an out-rider,
he busily buzzes by the main procession
of some 300 experienced bikers.
Gets a thumbs up from me in
tribute to his fearlessness.
I know at 69 you ache to slew
our big old tourer across a double lane,
in a You shall not pass attitude,
wearing an expression grim as death.
But my clenched muscles scream
Don’t you dare, as at 62
I feel the hot breath of mortality
on the back of my neck.