Will the Rain Never Stop?

There are faces I won’t see in the pits anymore.
Some are gone forever.
I don’t think about the wreck that took them,
but about the wreckage left behind.
Would they want me to stop?

Olive keeps hounding me.
Daddy, you keep breaking bones.
Why won’t you stop?
My ex coyly asks if she’s still on my life insurance plan.
I appreciate her humor.
Death is easy,
but being paralyzed or badly broken is not.
All I know is, I walk taller after a race.

Racing is always somewhere in my mind.
It’s my feel-good time.
The reward for getting my work done.
When I’m racing, all I can focus on, is what’s going on,
The pain of life is washed away with speed.

There’s no relief at the day job.
Why you need Saturday off?
We need you on the floor.
If you get hurt don’t come back.
They’re not smiling.

I try to find it on the track,
but there’s too much rain in my head.
They show me they mean business
by being heavy and not showing.
I don’t want them to see
if it goes wrong anyway.
I’m not blind, but it’s what I am.
Sitting in the stands doesn’t work for me.
I live for the green flag.
Peace comes when I drop the clutch.

I can’t get the ‘if you fall and get hurt’ vibe out of my head.
It’s just a fast street ride now.
It’s cold and lonely running second.
No traffic to heat it up.
Cold and uncompetitive is humbling.

I reflect in my black coffee.
I talk to him but he doesn’t answer.
The line between feels good
and what’s right is blurred.
Walking the line brings clarity.
Those are the times I carry with me.
The others were forgettable….