TO BOLDLY GLOW

Orange fluoro underpants hung
on a hook in the gym change room.
The waistband read Tradie –
others further up the food chain    
would boast Calvin Kleins, Bonds
or Chinese Armani lookalikes.

 

What kind of guy inhabits
these, I wondered
as the waist was narrow
unlike mine –
a plumber or mechanic.
in the gym working off 

an ache after last night's
celebration of whatever?

 

He sauntered in while I was showering:
I recognized him as the guy
on the bike beside mine
who was mopping up water
when I arrived so I asked him
if he'd any sweat left?
He’d dropped his water bottle,
he said and laughed –
maybe five years younger,
a whippet who pedalled
five times faster and further. 

 

Maybe he built racing bikes
by day and rode them, rejoicing,
on the road and in the sky at night,
nine-tenths naked so
his fluoro underpants would show.