The Poetry Bus
The Poetry Bus
Original Text
Pier Giorgio Di Cicco, A Burning Patience
(Ottawa: Borealis Press, 1978): 44.
1It's like a bus: "we're all full up",
2"try again next spring". Nobody steps off.
3It's the perennial bandwagon,
4tickets marked acceptance. Someone falls off
5of their own death, room for another. They line up
6credit lists in hand, their eyes flowering
7smart metaphors.
8Nobody wants to take tickets any more, but
9to move to the back of the bus where the singing
10and drinking goes on, waving from the windows,
11on a bus going, going.
12It's an old bus, lots of flags
13and we read of the happy accidents;
14it never gets to the last depot. It goes around
15the same town again and again.
16They're always advertising the grand tour.
17and they don't see a damned thing. They're
18always running to catch it, and everything whisks
19by them waiting for someone to walk by,
20to discover the world like an out of
21the way place, that never gets back
22to us by word of mouth, since it's
23always the last place we left behind.
Publication Start Year
1978
RPO poem Editors
Ian Lancashire
RPO Edition
2003
Rhyme
Special Copyright
Copyright Pier Giorgio Di Cicco 1978