Driving

We spent still time together, he and I:
two half-hour drives each day, respectively
to work and school. We'd talk of this and that,
or nothing, crossing craggy Pennine moors
to smoky towns. We came to terms, the man
and growing boy, before the parting when
the talking was sporadic, on the phone
and from our separate lives.

And at the end we spent a little time,
a half hour, he and I, near silent now,
unsure on my part if he knew me or,
by his silence and his distant eyes,
determined not to say goodbye, he lay
unreachable except through memory.
And I, surprised, was in the driving seat.