TRAIN SESTINA

A one-way ticket for a journey aboard the abandoned caboose    

A train car uncoupled set loose, long rolled off the rails 

Onto soft earth, stopped midway through its sway and rock

Clack and jostle, jerk and surf, churn through the night

Now derailed – sad, forgotten – the rhythm of tie, tie, tie

The feel of steel wheels racing over slick night tracks

We run, trip, find flattened pennies following the tracks 

With the new rhythm we bring to this empty caboose

Traveling, rounding a curve, tie follows tie follows tie 

We create sparks, heat in cool night, tongues following rails

Endlessly parallel, running to a new and sleepless night

Held in the freight car of a lover’s arms 

Rock bed, rock bed, rock bed, rock bed

The unpredictable, unscheduled, night train which will rock 

Like a dark mysterious ship, a vessel on the tracks

Booming cross-continent through the long night

I follow him, a hobo of love, to the lost caboose 

And we lean together, racing, sailing down the rails 

While swaying, mesmerized, we look down and count each tie

Close to the smell of cigarette, suede, a wooden tie

Fragrant with creosote 

Hot tar oozing onto gravel rock under the hot sun 

Cools as we breeze down the rails

Tongues slip in that dark night like wheels across tracks

Effortless, one gesture following another, as locomotive pulls caboose

Coupling wildly, engineered and conducted through the night

Rock bed, rock bed, rock bed, rock bed

With that chug chug and whoo in the night 

Our hips and thighs and hands explore and find that new tie                                               

Dark mystery, loose and falling, in that earthbound caboose 

With dark fallen, derailed yet racing, we plow with that sway and rock

Moving and pumping to propel and surf over the tracks

Pursuing that rumble that iron grace 

Of a train surging on the rails

Rumbling and trembling, I hear a train a-coming on the rails

Feeling the arc and ebb of my voice soar in the night

Finding what is and is not endless parallel that tracks 

Possess destinations, depots, roundabouts, the final tie 

And crossing spike, track, train track

This stopped train will rock and sail and sway

Churning forward pulling that caboose

Through long nights of clack and jostle and surge the new tie 

Of a journeying love, moving together over earth and rock

Sliding over slick night tracks loose and fast

In that still caboose

Rock bed, rock bed, rock bed, rock bed

Rock bed, rock bed, rock bed, rock bed

Rock bed, rock bed, rock bed, rock bed

Rock bed, rock bed, rock bed, rock bed