Wednesday, April 10, 2013

Travel Writing

artwork: ralph murre


Travel Writing
by Ralph Murre

Let’s not think of the car with no brakes at all.
Or the Studebaker the color of the dawning
of a very bad day, followed across Utah
by the blue cloud of its oil habit.
Let’s not think of its demise
in the cold of Colorado winter.
Let’s not think of the crashes in the old red Saab.
And not about the silvery Saab’s breakdowns
in Missouri or any of those in Wisconsin.
Not about pick-up trucks in ditches.
The Fourth-of-July Dakota incident.
Let’s not think of the green-and-white Ford
in a California junkyard, parts of its engine
missing.
A motorcycle lying in the gravel of Ontario.
My Rozinante loaded on a truck
in the Michigan morning.  Without ceremony.
We could also not think of the Illinois Tri-State
transmission trouble.  The fast lane.
And, by all means, let’s try not to think of hitting
anything
at seventy-five in the froggy-green Saturn
under the Hunter’s Moon of the big western sky.
Let’s not think of the mustard-colored Datsun.
Or vehicles built in England.
Let’s not think of Florida.
Or Boston.
Oh, Jesus, let’s not think of driving in Boston.


~ first published in Verse Wisconsin

Note:  As I posted this poem a few days ago, it felt appropriate to treat the City of Baked Beans and Banned Books with a bit of levity.  Today, in the wake of the tragic explosions there, I can only attempt to express my sympathy for the victims, for the city, and for an increasingly terrorized world.        ~ R.M.   4/15/13