The Train

I decide while

Diner neon blinks back from puddles in the street,

a street who also refuses to meet me halfway.

My car slumped into the backstreet corner

of a stumbling parking lot, I opt for freedom,

wet shoes, stepping off the parking curb blues.

The empty factories scream at me in a night

whistle, jagged windowpanes like teeth, gobbling

up the candy wrappers and leaving only rocks

and rusty tin cans, while the rain plays the warehouse

roof like a pawn shop marimba,

down the street.

I decide

thinking maybe a bottle green Cadillac would have

done the trick for her, or maybe a bottle

will do the trick for me ‘cuz she ain’t comin’ back.

But instead I’m lost on the east side of a city

That does nothing but sleep.  The train whistle

piercing the night splits the peaceful veneer in two.

And then I’m running, coins spilling from my pockets,

flapping soles of my shoes rising in a crescendo,

ragged jacket strangely not wanting to go this way,

trying to catch the next downtown train.

I

reach the two rails of snaking steel,

they’re ringing and my head’s ringing,

and the rocks are tripping over my feet, wavering,

some of them doubled over, and the light is brilliant.

I am dumb walking forward like a newspaper headline

read over coffee, but bathed in the light exposed like

an emotion, like farmers’ tan or a supermarket

expiration date that just won’t rub off,

and the sound is howling, really, bearing down.

But the train is drunk that night,

stumbling off the track and back,

my jacket the only fool here, gaping smile

down my arm, and I am smelling for the first time

the crisp smell of fresh, ripped leather.