Song of the sirens.

Out there in the dark the sirens sing
Not to seduce old  Odysseus but rather
to bear  οἱ πολλοί  from their  beginning  to their oblivion.

Through  the  rush of  traffic  they  thread  their  way  
from home, from  accident, to hospital with urgent wail,
and not  just  at  night, but throughout the day
they sing their messages in their rising scale .  

Flashing the blues and twos to reinforce their strident cry,
the police cars sound their peremptory commands
to drivers to pull to the kerb or else make way .

Motorists submit with curse or patient resignation
to that unquestioned right to control the road
and sit and wait,  mostly in perturbation  
as to what they have breached this time in the highway code.                                  
                                        
The whoopings of the fire trucks as they shout their joy
perhaps do not sound as urgent as the others
apparently concerned with property not people.

They sweep along bedecked in brassy gold and red,
White hoses ranked along each gleaming side,
Racing to where flame demons, voracious, tread
and spread their devouring flames both far and wide.

And I, in my restless sleep, hear a seductive song
which  grows  evermore  compelling, strong,
calling me into that darkness where they themselves belong.