Early Morning Train
Rob Schultz


In the rain--
houses hunched under trees
losing leaves;
sheets and
towels spread
on a line.
Glint
of headlights
retreating.
Backyards and
back-lots,
what the train
cuts through--
rearview
glimpse of
a wet world,
sheen of
aluminum-siding
like one end
of a rainbow
and glow of
kitchens up close
bright as fires
in a clearing,
women and girls
illuminated
in them.
Promise
of powdery hair winks by,
loose hand
pouring coffee,
as the train
jerks past a strip
of thinning woods,
a junkyard--cars
like gravestones
skirting dark dunes
of oozing tires--
beside yellow curb
of a jeep-lined
post office
parking lot.

I sip coffee,
buck a cup,
try to read
about Bumpus
and Huckabee
winning in
Arkansas.
But can't.
As dawn lifts,
sky pearl
tinged black,
the window draws
eye as if a still
earnest
ten year old--
yet feel my age,
years washing up,
another fall
passing,
future receding
as the train
speeds up,
sitting backward,
thoughts
clicking as if
cars on tracks.
Past flush of
burnt-red leaves
fluttering
to a stretch
of green
off one side
of a boarded-up
school, wobbly
white H's
of goal-posts
wavering in
the rain. And
yet sight
of yellow brush
sweeping by
a boat dock
and dimpled
surface of
a calm lake
move me like
cathedral light.
Tufts of pine
lead up a gully,
landscape like
a woman lying
on her back,
sudsy tops of thyme
winking in that
tender spot.
And then a
serpentine,
rock-filled
stream where
I imagine,
long ago,
a woman bathing
in the rain.