From the Vaults: Jenna Jarvis

Jenna Jarvis would have pronounced Robert Kroetsch's name correctly if given the opportunity.Jenna Jarvis discusses the car crash that was the inspiration for her poem in Issue XV.When I received the Puritan editorial team's comments on “Untoward,” they suggested that I swap the original title, “Poem-Story,” for something more spin-worthy. But this blog post is a story about a poem. A poem-story, if you will.“Poem-Story” is comprised of two true stories, which, taken together, are not true at all. Robert Kroetsch really did die in a car crash, and I really was involved in a taxi pile-up. However, we weren't in the same vehicle and/or city. I never shared a stage with Kroetsch, though I wish I had. I would be sure to pronounce his surname correctly.The Puritan suggested that I cut down on the “grad-school talk” in my original submission. This was all pretense, on my part. I received the Puritan acceptance email a couple of weeks after I turned 20, and I still think that “Untoward” is a pretty good poem for a 20-year-old. I'll be starting a Master's in English lit in September. I'll add that I flunked a fourth-year class the fall before applying, fought with one of my referees, and had to petition for an extension for the last of my undergrad work, but I got into both of the programs for which I applied and won a SSHRC grant. It is possible to emerge from these sorts of crashes.Anyway, I was nineteen and living with my parents in the burbs. (My dad thought 'Foucault' was a swear.) It was a hassle for me to go downtown and hang out with my friends, because the buses that would take me home stopped running at about 11:00PM or so. My dad would go to bed early for work, but he'd leave me money for a taxi.One night I took this money and went to the monthly reading series for In/Words magazine (which I currently co-edit). This boy who liked me wanted to wait for a bus with me once the reading was over, but I thought, “Nope,” and called a taxi for myself.The cabbie pulled an illegal U-turn to pick me up. I gave him my address, and he gave me his GPS.“You'll have to enter it in here, since I don't know where that is. It's my third day.”It was amateur night. I had to sit in the back shouting out which turns to make and all that. I made up my mind to get out at the nearest major bus stop, which was on the other side of the Rideau Canal. I said to go straight across the bridge, and he did, even though the light was red. I'm pretty sure that the cabbie never got that fourth day on the job, because he hit a taxi from the same fleet as ours. There was a cartoonish BANG that propelled me upward briefly; then, the seatbelt pressed hard against me.No one was hurt, but the taxis' front ends were fucked up nicely. The drivers got out of the cars and swore at each other in Arabic. I wasn't sure what they were saying or what I should do.. There were more red lights flashing behind me. It was an ambulance. I don't know where it came from. If it really was tailgating, well, that was lucky for me, I guess. It would be luckier if I hadn't been stuck with the newbie cabbie.I figured that I should let the EMT people know that I was okay, all things considered, so I flashed a thumbs-up and remained in the cab until they opened the door.They asked, “Are you okay?”“Yes,” I replied.I surveyed the damage, and it was a good thing that I didn't laugh; otherwise, the EMTs would have wanted to check me for a brain injury. The taxi I was riding in had its front wheel and bumper lodged between the front wheel and bumper of the other taxi. It was Taxiception—or worse, The Taxi Centipede. (The Puritan removed the “Taxiception” joke. I did not take my chances with The Taxi Centipede.)I stepped away from the cars, still watching everything. Newbie Cabbie called after me, “You'll have to phone another taxi.”“No, I don't think I will,” I answered, and I continued to walk across the bridge.Jenna Jarvis has been published by Conduit Canada, The Puritan, and Bywords.ca, among others. She is the winner of the 2012 John Newlove Poetry Awardand will release a chapbook, titled The Tiger with the Crooked Mouth, with Bywords in October 2013. You can read some of her writing and her contrarian thoughts on the publishing racket at http://anti-malahat.tumblr.com/.