Saturday 28 March 2009

Ode To An Escort Wagon


O car of green from ninety-six
We bought you in good faith
It wasn't long before we knew
We'd made a big mistake.
At first you cruised with love and flair,
Zipped through streets with vigour
But soon we thought you must be haunted
Or at least filled up with liquor.

When your heater we turned on,
The ceiling lights would flicker
And when your hatch defroster lit,
Your engine would start to bicker.
Music blared from speakers rear,
But from the front did not,
If we cared to hear it thus,
It gurgled as if shot.

Soon your engine took a fit
And revved without a cue
Mechanics scratched their heads with frowns,
They didn't have a clue.
Finally the quiz was solved
And you almost purred like a kitten,
Then Christmas Eve you threw a belt
And we all felt much like shittin'.

Later on your tires went bald,
You jerked and slipped, you did
Just five minutes in the snow
Struck fear in us when you slid.
We bought new tires and thus survived
A winter full of flakes
When Spring sprang forth with all its warmth
Alas, we needed brakes.

We took a look at all our books
And fiddled with finances,
To throw good money after bad
Would lessen all our chances
For health and safety on the road,
We had to make a decision -
So off to Toyota's store we went
On a spanking new car mission.

We found a lovely vehicle
With shiny glass and steel
For the first time in all our years
We have two cars we feel
Are happy, healthy, humming cars
With CD players in both,
No old cassette tape misery
Or sluggish, rusty sloth.

No gaffers tape, no filthy oil,
No wires holding up the bottom,
No scratchy music from the back
The new cars they don't got 'em.
No rust, no scratches, no bare spots,
No peeling from the sides,
Our two new cars will fill our days
With hundreds of great rides.

11 comments:

Barbara Martin said...

Great poem, Sandra, and I recognize the necessity of getting rid of a vehicle that burns a hole in your pocket with never ending repairs.

writtenwyrdd said...

I had an 85 Escort in baby blue (a color I always detested in the worst way.) But that car ran and ran and ran with never an oil change and only brief pauses for mechanical repairs. I got rid of it when it was so rusted out it was in danger of collapse, the rain leaked below the windshield to make a puddle in the carpet (where weeds actually grew) and the gas mileage still was 28mpg despite all the abuse.

It was a great car. :)

Sandra Cormier said...

I forgot to mention it has lousy gas mileage. I think I got 200 kilometres out of a full tank. How does that translate to mpg? I can't do the math. That's why I'm a writer.

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Sandra Cormier said...

Wow. My first spam. I feel so special.

BernardL said...

LOL! Don't forget to take care of them. :)

Patti said...

Okay you just told the story of my life last August. We had a ford wagon and it was dying so we bought a Honda Civic then we couldn't sell the Ford so we fixed it up and now we have three vehicles.