The Geographic North Pole

The summer of 1974 was brutally hot in New York and I kept thinking about how
nice and icy it must be at the North Pole. And then I though, ў‚¬"Wait a second,
why not go?ў‚¬ќ You know, like in cartoons where they hang going to the North
Pole on their door knobs and they just take off.
So I spent a couple of weeks preparing for the trip, getting a hatchet,
a huge backpack, maps, knives, sleeping bags, lures and a three month supply
of Banic, a versatile high-protein paste that can be made into flat bread,
biscuits or cereal.
Now I had decided to hitch hike and one day I just walked out onto Austin
Street, weighing down seventy pounds of gear, and stuck out my thumb.
ў‚¬Ђќ Going North? I asked the driver as I struggled into a station wagon.
After I got out of New York, most of the rides were trucks until I reached the
Hudson Bay and began to hitch in small mail planes. The pilots were usually
guys whoў‚¬"ўd gone to Canada to avoid the draft or else embittered Vietnam
vets who never wanted to go home again. Either way they always wanted to show
off a few of their stunts. Weў‚¬"ўd go swooping along the rivers doing loop do
loops and baby ###080 152. And theyў‚¬"ўd drop me off at an airstrip.
ў‚¬"Thereў‚¬"ўll be another plane by here couple of weeks; see ya; good luck.
ў‚¬ќ
I never did make it all the way to the geographic pole; it turned out to be a
restricted area and no one was allowed to fly in or even over it.
I did get within a few miles of the magnetic pole though. So it wasnў‚¬"ўt
really that disappointing. I entertained myself in the evenings,
cooking or smoking, and watching the blazing light of the huge Canadian
sunsets as they turned the lake into fire.
Later I lay on by back, looking up at the Northern lights and imagining
thereў‚¬"ўd been a nuclear holocaust and that I was the only human being left
in all of North America and what would I do then.
And then, when these lights went out, I stretched out on the ground,
watching the stars as they turned around and their enormous silent ###080 318.
I finally decided to turn back because of my hatchet. Iў‚¬"ўd been chopping
some wood and the hatchet flew out of my hand on the upswing. And I did what
you should never do when this happens: I looked up to see where it had gone and
it came down ў‚¬Ђќ fffooo ў‚¬Ђќ just missing my head and I thought, ў‚¬"My God!
I could be working around here with a hatchet embedded in my skull and Iў‚¬"ўm
ten miles from the airstrip. And nobody in the whole world knows where I am.
ў‚¬ќ
Daddy Daddy, it was just like you said
Now that the living outnumber the dead
Where I come from itў‚¬"ўs a long thin thread
Across an ocean. Down a river of red
Now that the living outnumber the dead
Speak my language