Poem: In a train

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In a train

Never have I loved so well
the life given me
as when I was rocked
by the four o’clock train
from Chicago to Lansing in 1968,
the lap and arms of iron and steel
holding me, window-framed,
a vibrating twelve-year-old witness
to the dusky backside balconies
of yellow brick apartments
with Hancock’s black tower fading behind,
and I, eating the cool green grapes
my married sister packed, cold
fried chicken, a red and white
paper napkin tucked in a brown bag,
lumbering slowly past city windows
reflecting Magikist neon, where red-trim-
aproned women, the same
high-heeled secretaries I’d seen
on Michigan Avenue, were now fingering
the radio knob for jazz or polka while my train
lullabyed me home toward the small town
of my dull, window-gazing life,
but for a few minutes more, still here,
alone, humming along in the city.

Poetry should be heard.

Posted for the dVerse train poem challenge. This is my first time participating in this really terrific poetry community called dVerse Poets Pub hosted today by Claudia Schoenfeld of jaywalking the moon.

Paintings by Edward Hopper: "Approaching the City" and "Woman on a Train"

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