I've been fascinated by railroads since I was five
and we moved to a house near the Illinois Central
tracks. Every day there were mystical names and
the promise of exotic places rolling by - Southern
Pacific, the Soo Line, Erie Lackawana. Sixty yea


Road of Cinders and Rust

Where it goes now no one knows or cares
And those who had ridden these rusty rails,
Following their winding, dusty dreams

To some other life they never quite reached
At the end of the line, dream no more.
But the track moves on, in its way . . .

Heaving up into late Autumns' frosts,
Burrowing deep under long winters' snow,
Sinking in the marshy softness of Spring.

And if you lean your ear against the rails
You can hear wheels in the distance there
Where parallels meet and destinies converge.

The land too remembers what it was:
What arrives here now, returning to itself,
Both to what it was and will be again,

The wild exuberance of seeds and seasons.
Even now prairie grass is creeping close,
Yellow foxtail, red sorrel and white yarrow;

Cross-ties splintering back into the ground.
One day maples, birch and oak will grow here,
The track-bed stones all weathered to dust.

I'll not be here then to walk this way . . .
But it's enough to know that someone will,
Following a deer trail through the woods.




Poetry by countryfog
Read 412 times
Written on 2010-12-07 at 14:58

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Lawrence Beck The PoetBay support member heart!
Well done, Fog. It's a nicely written poem, and, as you've seen, its subject touches a nerve, maybe a couple of them. Lots of people are fond of railroads, and many of us find something sad-interesting-thought-provoking about structures that are abandoned and decaying.

I remembered two of those after I'd read your poem. One was an old logging railroad bed I used to see up in the Cascades. It did have fairly large trees growing up in the middle of it. The other was the ruins of the famed Catskills resort, Grossinger's, which I saw last fall. These are so vast, strange and sad that someone posted pictures of them on the Internet. They're worth a look.
2010-12-12



I don't see why it should be so, but there seems something primal about rails and trains. Perhaps it's the power. I grew up a block from the Chicago & Northwestern, which was a commuter line between Chicago and Milwaukee. For me and my buddies it was off limits, our mothers' tried to frightened us off with tales of hoboes. Which might have been true in the thirties, but not in the carefree fifties. For us it was pennies on the tracks, and walking the ties. When I was in high school the train was the last resort if I missed the bus or hitchhiking didn't work. But the greatest pleasure was lying in bed listening to the trains. It seemed other worldly.
2010-12-08


josephus The PoetBay support member heart!
Great Stuff! We seem to have led parallel lives. I find myself relating completely to what you write and in this case even more so.

I recall a passage purported to be by a Roman living in England in the fourth century describing a sapling growing in the middle of a disused and forgotten Roman Road.

Sic Transit Gloria Mundi !

Joe
2010-12-07