Prior Train Posts:
A Train to Christmas (my favorite ride - picture me, husband, infant daughter, 3 year old son instead of just Millie and her mom - true story otherwise)
40th Anniversary Ride
Taking Tricky Trains and Tricky Teeth
But I digress. (Don't you love that phrase? Who invented that?)
Here is my poem for today with a train theme.
 |
| through the Maine Eastern Railway doors - in one, out the other |
doorway
to another era
window
to a world gone by
step aboard
and see
more clearly
sides of life
with a new eye
back door stories
hidden lives
things unseen on
front door drives
trucks unloading
trash disposing
entries neat
rears awry
under bridges
cans of fire
warming, lighting
keeping dry
graffiti speaks but
not to rovers
on sceneshifters
such as I
backyard linens
doghouse, fences
children waving
babies cry
lakes and rivers
over bridges
turning gray to blue
of sky
undefiled space
few beholders
privileged there
to espy
deer and fawn
hawks and herons
unsurprised as
we speed by
back door stories
hidden lives
unbeseeming
should we spy?
undefiled space
peaceful landscape
unseen scenery
do we pry?
 |
| scene from the train window |
there was a point in life that the hobo life would have appealed to me...like keroacs writing..seeing the world out of the open door...eating out of a can cooked over a small fire...wish we had more undefiled landscape
ReplyDeleteSomeday you will have to come to Maine and ride the Downeaster or the old Maine Eastern. Both have relaxing rides through undefiled water views and landscapes.
DeleteThis is almost as good as sitting there and travelling in the train. Life as seen through the eyes that travel.
ReplyDeleteMy grandson loves trains - Thomas and Company, and even Mr. Rogers with Trolley! Someday soon, he's going to have to come along on a real train trip. I wonder how old you have to be to have eyes that recognize what they are seeing.
DeleteYes! There are such quick then hidden glimpses of other lives!
ReplyDeleteAnd they really are pretty quick!
DeleteI guess train journeys allow us insights into people's lives in ways that no there means of transport do, these 'sides of life with a new eye'.
ReplyDeleteThe view from the train tracks is so much different than the street view!
DeleteI like the way you described train journeys, and I can so identify... I haven't traveled much in the USA on trains, but between WI and Chicago I have definitely seen the backside of life -- the hanging linens, trucks unloading, etc. It is interesting actually to travel seeing that view. I like your questions: should we spy? should we pry? I enjoyed 'traveling' with you!
ReplyDeleteMy story on the first link is a slightly fictionalized version of our trip home from Wisconsin to Maine, with Christmas Eve in Grand Central Station when my son was 3 and daughter 7 months.
DeleteI do like traveling by train.
Very evocative. You put me right there, Donna - staring out the train window to the sound of the clickety-clacks. Thoughtfully penned.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Wendy! Glad you could come aboard!
DeleteOne does get a different view from a train window. I enjoyed the rhythm of this poem that seemed to me to be quite train-like!
ReplyDeleteYea! After I wrote it I realized I had subconsciously written the scenes with a train rhythm.
DeleteLove the flow of this piece and the scenes you've captured. Felt as though I was on a train journey.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Kathryn! I'm happy you enjoyed the "trip"!
DeleteReally enjoyed the train journey with you...what a lovely sketch of life in motion....
ReplyDeleteLove it ... your short lines and snippet scenes reflect a train journey perfectly ...
ReplyDelete