The Bus Of The Damned, A Twitter Epic

Posted 16 October, 2011 in Travel

Last night I took a trip from central Pennsylvania back to my home in New York City. It didn’t go well. Here’s my account of the doomed voyage, as told to my Twitter followers. You can be one of them by following @jasondcrane.

The story begins about an hour into the trip…

• 8:48 p.m. — Looks like our bus has broken down somewhere in rural PA. No announcement yet, but we’ve been on the roadside for a while now.
• 8:54 p.m. — It is very, very, very dark out here in rural PA. The bus is completely off. We’re sitting in absolute darkness.
• 9:00 p.m. — Aaaand now we’re moving again. Let’s see how long this lasts. I keep expecting the bus driver to be Rod Serling.
• 9:04 p.m. — I’m no mechanic, but I give this bus a 40% chance of making it to New York City.
• 9:06 p.m. — I also love that the bus driver hasn’t said one word to us all this time about what happened.
• 9:50 p.m. — We just hit a deer. This bus is doomed.
• 10:03 p.m. — Post-deer, we’re pulled over again. The bus driver asked for a male pasenger to go outside with her. I went. Front of the bus is smashed.
• 10:15 p.m. — We’re going to limp along to a rest area where we’ll switch to another, hopefully less doomed, bus.
• 10:42 p.m. — I’d like to publicly thank @reneeyoxon for suggesting I make this Voyage Of The Damned today.
• 10:46 p.m. — Picture, if you will, a man trapped on an eternal bus ride through Pennsylvania. There’s a signpost up ahead. It reads…The @Megabus Zone.
• 10:57 p.m. — Driver has MacGyvered part of the busted headlight and Mr. @Megabus has cleared us to leave. Driver is eating a salad. Then we’ll go.
• 11:01 p.m. — “@Megabus: We’ll get at least part of your bus to its destination, no matter what we have to kill along the way.”
• 11:08 p.m. — Sweet weeping Jesus, we’re on the road! New York here we (possibly) come (if we don’t hit anything else)!
• 12:34 a.m. — You have got to be kidding me. Now we’re stuck in a looong line of cars on the highway at 12:33 a.m. Accident? Construction? God hates me?
• 12:45 a.m. — I don’t know what I did to anger the gods before this bus trip, but I’d like to apologize.
• 1:03 a.m. — People are getting out of their cars and walking around on the highway. That’s a good sign, right? I hate Pennsylvania.
• 1:06 a.m. — It’s on nights like this that I wish I still had the cyanide tablet that Mom used to pack in my lunchbox.
• 1:32 a.m. — Guy behind me is having a heated argument with a woman. He keeps smacking my seat. I ask him quietly to stop. He starts yelling at me.
• 1:35 a.m. — A breakdown. A deer strike. A huge accident. We haven’t moved in an hour. Six hours and counting for a 4.5 hour trip. Not out of PA yet.
• 1:47 a.m. — We are doing a k-turn. In a bus. On the highway. No idea where we might be going. Doesn’t look good.
• 1:54 a.m. — Off the highway. Driving on surface streets through a small Jersey town. Presumably toward our next accident or hijacking.
• 2:01 a.m. — Passed a billboard that said “Think Red.” Guy behind me yelling into his phone. At someone on the upper level of this bus. I’m thinking red.
• 2:07 a.m. — The guy behind me is so loud that the bus driver just turned on her mic to ask him to be quiet. And you’ll never believe why he’s angry…
• 2:08 a.m. — …He’s angry because he apparently fell asleep with his thumb in his mouth and his partner slapped it out. And he’s enraged.
• 2:16 a.m. — Every other truck that was rerouted by the cops continued straight on this road. We exited. We’re pulled over again. Driver on her cell.
• 2:24 a.m. — If we ever do reach Manhattan, I’ll still have to get to Brooklyn by subway in the wee hours on a Sunday.
• 2:41 a.m. — Hour 7 of this 4.5 hour trip.
• 2:55 a.m. — We’re at the Lincoln Tunnel. I may start crying with joy.
• 3:04 a.m. — Off the bus. Headed for the subway.
• 3:55 a.m. — Home. Going to bed. My 4.5 hour trip took 8.5 hours. Good night, Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are.

POEM: The Blues

Posted 14 January, 2011 in Audio Poems, Music, My poems, Poetry, Travel

Listen to this poem using the player above.

I wrote this on the bus from Albany to New York City.

The Blues

1.

it all goes back to the blues
that’s what they’d have you believe
the gravel your boots crunch
must lead to a dusty crossroad
every baby’s cry is a bottleneck slide
on the worn strings of a scarred guitar
whiskey runs from the kitchen faucet
the radiator’s busted so body heat will have to do

2.

snowscape bus rides to big city lights
he’s seated across from a pale redhead
who looks like she’s crying but isn’t
he pretends to be watching the trees
safe in the anonymity of sunglasses
they won’t be meeting later in a juke joint
she won’t nurse a beer or lean in close
to hear him over the sound of the band

stone #13

Posted 13 January, 2011 in aros, Audio Poems, My poems, Poetry, Stones, Travel

Listen using the player above.

/ / /

the trick to travel
isn’t remembering
your underwear or socks
it’s knowing which books to take

/ / /

part of a river of stones

VIDEO POEM: maple leaf

Posted 28 December, 2010 in My poems, Poetry, Travel, Video Poems

I wrote this poem a couple years ago during a train trip from Albany, NY, to Rochester, NY. (The poem is in my book, Unexpected Sunlight.) I shot the video yesterday while traveling by train from New York City to Albany. As always, I like to acknowledge my debt to Dave Bonta for inspiring me to try my hand at video poems.

POEM: Ah, Basho, who were you really?

Posted 12 December, 2010 in Audio Poems, Japan, My poems, Poetry, Travel

Listen to this poem using the player above.

I first lived in Japan from 1991-92. During that time I picked up a Penguin edition of Japanese haiku master Matsuo Basho’s book Narrow Road To The Deep North. I’ve loved him ever since. Not just his work, but the very idea of him.

Ah, Basho, who were you really?

My friend the Japanese literature scholar –
by which I mean to say he is a scholar
of Japanese literature and a literature scholar
who is Japanese — thinks you were a ninja.
Or a famous warrior of some sort.
I can’t quite remember. But his point
is that no mere poet could have passed through
all those military checkpoints.
And no old-man poet could have covered
all that ground as fast as you say you did.
Were you lying? Is all poetry fiction?

Perhaps you started out from Tokyo –
they called it Edo then –
with every intention of completing the journey
along that famous narrow road.
Perhaps you packed your paper and brushes
to write those glorious verses.
Perhaps you set out upon the path,
made it as far as the first resting place
before your old bones got the better
of your young heart.
Poets invent whole worlds –
all you needed to do was describe
the world that already existed. Even a mortal
could do that.

Me, I like the ninja idea.
Poets are thought of as many things –
deadly is rarely one of them.
We need more poet ninjas, creeping about
on moonless nights, stealing
into the rooms of young lovers, leaving
a verse or two on the pillow.
Gone as silently as the break
in this line.

Then again, maybe I’d rather
you were just a poet.
Not a liar. Not a ninja.
Not a warrior traveling in disguise.
Just a man who wished to see the mountains
of Japan’s interior with his own eyes.
A man who used his paper and his brushes
to let us see those same mountains,
thousands of miles away,
all these many years later.

POEM: Pennsylvania or bust (November Poem-A-Day 14)

Posted 14 November, 2010 in Audio Poems, My poems, Poetry, Travel

Listen to this poem using the player above.

This is poem #14 for the November Poem-A-Day challenge. Today’s prompt was to write a “crossroads” poem.

Pennsylvania or bust

five hours from anywhere
he stares out the bus window
wipes off the occasional
condensation, sign of life
the big buildings of the city
give way to the small towns
on the border then to the
trees and trees and trees
there are still pastures here
acres and acres of land
given over to cows and sheep
he falls asleep as the sun sets
head resting against the window
dreams traveling
in the opposite direction

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