The Jockey

Atop his exhausted buggy with its rusted wheels and now-stuck key, one boot missing, a faded jersey, the bill of his cap cracked off, he sits behind a nicked brown horse that once flicked its tail, clattered around planked floor or rug when the buggy was wound after school by children who've since fallen behind him, white-haired or gone, as he still waves the flopping spring of his crop, still stares through dimming goggles, gathering gray ribbons of dust in his silent, frozen race down an ever-unfurling track, hunched to win, leaving far back all claps and laughter, his once-smooth face scarred and pitted, just the white fleck of a smile now, more a sneer, his empty fists on the reins of air still holding tight.