Richard Shindell - Transit

The merge from the turnpike was murder, but it’s never a cinch 


It was Friday at five, and no one was giving an inch 


They squeezed and the edged and they glared 


Half them clearly impaired by rage or exhaustion 


The rest were just touchy as hell 





Somewhere near Paterson everything slowed to a crawl 


The all-news station was thanking someone for the call 


It’s a van from St. Agnes’s choir 


There’s a nun out there changing a tire 


By the time they got by her, tempers were out of control 





So they all hit the gas in a dash for position 


Bobing and weaving and flashing their highbeams 


Fliping the bird and screaming obscenities 


A well-insured hoard hell-bent on Saturday 





And so they continued west-bound and into the sun 


Law and decorum constraining nary a one 


By then it was devil-may-care 


Not one even vaguely aware 


That they had come all the way to the Delaware Water Gap 





But how had it happened? They had all missed their exits 


How had it happened? Was it some kind of vortex? 


And in they all went, bumper to bumper 


Faster and faster, no sign of a trooper 


In they all went, like sheep to the slaughter 


Bankers and carpenters, doctors and lawyers 


And in they all went, families in minivans 


Ashcroft republicans, weekend militiamen 


They followed the river, and rounded the bend 


Between minsi and tammany and into their destiny 


Lying in ambush right their before them 


The angry old sun right on the horizon 





Sister Maria tightened the bolts of the spare 


She said a quick prayer and put the old van into gear 


Thank God that the traffic was light 


If she hurried she might not be late 


For that evening’s performance at the state penetentiary 





She entered the common room and their was her choir 


Altos and baritones, basses and tenors 


Car thieves and crack dealers, mobsters and murderers 


Husbands and sons, fathers and brothers 


And so it began in glorious harmony 


Softly and Tenderly – calling for you and me 


With the interstate whining way off in the distance 


And the sun going down through the bars of the prison 


They poured out their souls, they poured out their memories 


They poured out their hopes for what’s left of eternity 


To sister Maria – her soul like a prism 


For the light of forgiveness on all of their faces












		
			



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