Zelda's Inferno exercise: a travel poem

Zelda's Inferno exercise: write a poem about travel, literal or figurative -- with a cherry on top (literal or figurative)

the car does not like these mountains
there are no switchbacks here, just a straight charge 2,000 feet up
and at 140,000 miles the engine is not as strong as once it was

but all true paths lead through mountains, as Snyder Sensei tells us --
there must be a challenge in the journey
so I turn off the AC, roll down the windows
accepting the heat so that we may have the power to climb this peak
push the pedal to the floor as if this would push the car along, like kicking off on a skateboard

I am headed to Ohio for the first time in my life (not counting a highway exit missed a few years ago)
the eleventh state I've visited
(not counting DC, which should but doesn't yet)
the other side of the Appalachians
headed for a gathering of the tribes

a temporary autonomous zone
a bubble of different spacetime generated by the combined willpower of a couple hundred freaks
a place of celebration and investigation and magic
a time of work and play and love
where drummers and dancers pound and leap late into the night
until the ashes of the bonfire glow cherry-red