Idle Trains

 

Easing through the East Main fog

with eyes as brown as rusty mufflers

smacked against the salty curb

she lifts her tiny dancer’s feet

till the carwash, the armory

& the lockshop have all passed by.

Like a sliver of the universe unfilled

she disappears beyond the viaduct where

pigeons sleep like corn-stuffed ghosts

& boxcars creek like a deaf girl’s moan

behind idle trains of the orange night

as she turns the key, as she unlocks

the door. As she takes off those

small pink boots it lies beside her

like a pool of rain upon the ground.

 

 

 

 

 

[Published in Prairie Falcon.

© 1989 by Jim Cohn.] 

 

 

APPEARS IN

Prairie Falcon
(North Atlantic Books, 1989)