Famous Blue Raincoat

 I was always singing in the car, you wouldn’t have wanted to be there, 

I have a terrible voice.

It was four in the morning the end of October

I was driving alone on a long journey down the island

to see Leonard Cohen in concert in Vancouver the next day.

There was an unexpected snowfall, but I managed to plow through

 in my old vintage car, a ‘65 Pontiac Barracuda

 (with the glass back, my first car!)

Nice and heavy, but slow going in the deepening snow

through the Nimpkish valley, only a few cars on the road.

I noticed a car had slid off the shoulder ahead of me

so I stopped to see, and it was my friend Chris Nancarrow! (the painter)

and her friend, down in the ditch sitting in their car

which had landed gently in the deep snow, and still upright.

And they were fine, quite cozy, wrapped in fur coats 

(looking  like a scene out of Dr Zhivago)

 waiting for a tow truck, and waved me on.

It’s very strange, looking back now, how lucky

they were, and lucky for me too because I didn’t

have to stay and help (and maybe miss the concert?)

I don’t recall what I sang on that road trip

I had the Joni Mitchell ‘Blue’ tape that I usually played

driving so I probably sang every song over and over.

I do remember I was wearing my blue raincoat in Cohen’s honour

(not famous, not torn at the shoulder but still pretty worn)


Challenge: craft a poem that recounts an experience of driving/riding and singing in the car, incorporating a song lyric. Day 18

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