A train’s a desolate sound
when skies darken
and the dervish flame
above the mill’s tower
is life’s only movement,
life’s only dance.
A train sings a gypsy’s song
rolling through the night
to make Buffalo or Detroit
before breakfast,
to make the Dakotas
and the great prairie.
Frost on the honeysuckle,
ice coating the vines,
are winter’s tokens
when life’s end reconciles
with its beginning and spring
arises from death’s sojourn.
In the Midwest
nothing is accomplished
without the wind;
snow drifts over our
cringing land as winter drives
its hard bargain home.
