Etude in Z Minor
by: Allison Ewing
© 2001

It’s a good thing the wheels still roll.
Otherwise we’d have a harder time
pushing Dad’s old car out of the garage –
a dusty 260 Z from 1974.

The car was my dad’s in the Navy;
driven until he replaced it in 1996
I rode to kindergarten in the Z car –
We roared into carpool, radio blaring.

Dad tells us to “heave” and so we do
and he jumps in just when we don’t
need to heave anymore, braking
Down the hill to a smooth stop.

Every time I think I have Dad figured out
We do something like this, a new project
and this shift in perspective shows me
a new side to the man I’ve always known.

Watching him with the Z, I glimpse
the taste of freedom when he drove it
And I also see, as he polishes the mirror
the care that balances this freedom.

The sun shines as we attack the dust of years
with hose and soap and sponge and brush.
Rays through the trees catch dust motes in flight
water runs down the newly shined windshield