Where the Old Chevy Died

I’m hoping for good weather

For a ride up 45

Past Appleton, Short of Green Bay,

Riding through the wind and sun,

Past the lakes and farms,

With their attendant smells,

Going up the old way,

Before the interstates

Like we did in the fifties,

In a powder blue Chevy,

With the stink of the Nekoosa paper mill

And the scum on the Petenwell Flowage

Signaling our imminent arrival,

Kicking up red dust the last ten miles

To a forty acre farm

Where the blue Chevy died

And the North Woods came down,

Before they were plowed under

And the potato fields went in.