One love, One Life

Not a curve too many

A review by prose seems ridiculous
In a matter describing such excellence
So instead I return to verse to release
A description of my Lotus Elise

To make her road legal, a few elements were added
Blinkers that blink, horns that honk and an exhaust that filters!
Similarities with other cars are semantically possible
But comparing car personalities is technical infeasible

For she is of the tiny sort, nimble and light
1980 pounds is her empty weight, with me more slight
And then her wheels run on a motor, one-point-eight
That calls to her services, horses, exactly one-ninety-eight

An unique construction, somewhat of a tub
Of aluminum whole and its fiber glass covers
Conceals a mid-engine chassis, superbly tight
With sprung and un-sprung masses massed just right

And this insane penance for weight savings,
Is a Lotus Philosophy that never wavers
But also a testimony to its ability to produce
Unrealistic but super-car-like numbers

Count the five fingers, and before you reach the fifth
I would be doing sixty, in gear much lower than sixth
And if you wish to turn, she will respond with glee
Pushing almost unity in lateral G

But these numbers, these numbers are dreadful
A terrible way to paint her picture
For I don’t care what her manual or a magazine says
Its specifications are material for geeks like me, but not today

You cannot quantify the perfectness of the steering, its size to start
Its feel so linear and so direct, that no power steering can reproduce
With its uncanny ability to translate asphalt ribbons that I traverse
She provides a constant source of chat, even if the road is terse

There is a strange feeling of flatness as you round the bend
At speeds that defy odds, with senses that refuse to comprehend
She sticks solidly through mechanical grip at lower speeds,
Her diffuser spewing dead leaves and dead broken twigs

Through this magical journey, her engine provides the score
Opening its taps at revs that vary with temperature of the engine core
My ears listen to fables that the tires and engines tell
Convinced that this is the start, middle and end of a fairy tale

It is tale of absorption by a machine and her aluminum chassis
That I wear like a glove, of mechanical proportions
She and I fuse, my hands gluing themselves, at ignition start
To finally compete what began with her four wheels and my heart.