Karaoké 30,000 Pounds of Bananas Harry Chapin

It was just after dark when the truck started down the hill that leads into Scranton

Pennsylvania

Carryin' thirty thousand pounds of bananas

Carryin' thirty thousand pounds

Hit it big John

Of bananas

He was a young driver just out on his second job and he was carryin' the next day's pasty fruits

For everyone in that coal-scarred city where children play without despair

In backyard slag piles and folks manage to eat each day

About thirty thousand pounds of bananas

Yes just about thirty thousand pounds

Scream it again John

Of bananas

He passed a sign that he should have seen

Sayin' Shift to low gear

A fifty dollar fine my friend

He was thinkin' perhaps about the warm-breath woman who was waitin' at the journey's end

He started down the two mile drop

The curvin' road that wound from the top of the hill

He was pushin' on through the shortenin' miles that ran down to the depot

Just a few more miles to go

Then he'd go home and have her ease his long cramped day away

And the smell of thirty thousand pounds of bananas

Yes the smell of thirty thousand pounds of bananas

He was pickin' up speed as the city spread its twinklin' lights below him

But he paid no heed as the shiverin' thoughts of the night's delights went through him

His foot nudged the brakes to slow him down but the pedal floored easy without a sound

He said Christ

It was funny how he had named the only man who could save him now

He was trapped inside a dead-end hellslide

Ridin' on his fear-hunched back was every one of those yellow green

I'm tellin' you thirty thousand pounds of bananas

Yes there were thirty thousand pounds of bananas

He barely made the sweepin' curve that led into the steepest grade

And he missed the thankful passin' bus at ninety miles an hour

And he said God

Make it a dream

God

Make it a dream as he rode his last tread down

He said God

Make it a dream

God

Make it a dream as he rode his last tread down

And he sideswiped nineteen neat-parked cars

Clipped off thirteen telephone poles

Hit two houses

Bruised eight trees and Blue Crossed seven people

It was then he lost his head

Not to mention an arm or two before he stopped

And he smeared for four hundred yards along the hill that leads into Scranton Pennsylvania

All those thirty thousand pounds

Of bananas

You know the man who told me about it on the bus as it went up the hill out of Scranton Pennsylvania

He shrugged his shoulders

He shook his head and he said

And this is exactly what he said

Boy

It sure must've been somethin'

Just imagine thirty thousand pounds of bananas

Yes there were thirty thousand pounds of mashed bananas

Of bananas

Bananas

Just bananas

Thirty thousand pounds of bananas

Not no driver now

Just bananas