OK, now there are two of them....
Union Pacific #1
landscape at 8,000 feet the rocks’ iron bones the
cranial frigid mesas the wind turbines off
kilter quixotic swoosh a
freight train skating across the tableland west of
Cheyenne be-
tween the sagebrush & the fog & cell towers a
tourist log cabin advertising wi fi espresso Native American
gifts
a yellow locomotive skating a
line of rust orange hoppers hauling coal &
graffiti west the
pump jacks’ atavistic nods grazing for natural gas
I will always be lonesome & the radio only broadcasts static
at this elevation
Laramie in a blue fog light has dis-
appeared from the rearview how many miles back a copper
bust of Lincoln hulking over the highway I will always be
lonesome at this elevation
a freight train skating across the
great divide the cold grinding of couplers this morning at
19 degrees at the Rawlins’ siding I will always be
traveling thru time between the blue blue fog & the
sagebrush & a series of semi-trucks clattering &
whooshing over the great divide
which is lone-
someness made stone & wind & a longing for a
home amongst the fog & freight trains
Union Pacific #2
shattered glass sunrise across the Snake River
scarlet broken an osprey’s nest on a phone pole an
aluminum boat a bridge on concrete piers an
island
the sky yellow the clouds gray the
birds black against the horizon in unison
telepathic purposeful rippling
shattered glass sunrise
dispersal
onion skins scattered along the road south of
Annex, Oregon
the Snake River’s
scarlet facets & heartbreak ripples
yellow sky underlined with birds
a phone pole
an aluminum boat I am traveling in various
& contradictory directions west & east a-
cross a shattered river under
this shattered sky
Jack Hayes
© 2010
Wow! I love these, John! I somehow missed the first version of Union Pacific #1, but I'm certainly glad to be here. I've said it before about this form you've created, but I want to tell you again how I love the piling on of images that results in a breathless ride and a rush of feeling. Wonderful work.
ReplyDeleteHi Karen: Thanks! I do appreciate your kind words & your appreciation!
ReplyDeleteI like all the clattering and whooshing, the hauling of coal and graffiti.
ReplyDeleteGood poems. They remind me (I've mentioned him before) of Harry Partch - particularly his US Highball (a journey across the US based on riding trains as a hobo).
ReplyDeleteSome of the lyrics are here
http://www.corporeal.com/lyrical.html
(a great page generally, too!)
Hi Willow & Dominic
ReplyDeleteWillow: Thanks!
Dominic: An interesting site & an interesting set of lyrics. I'm happy to say I've been to most of the towns mentioned in US Highball, including Imlay, NV, which is (in Utah Phillips' words about another western US town) "half a ghost town."
Union Pacific #2, I like what you're doing with the birds - first the image of them "telepathic purposeful rippling", and then the sky underlined with them. Like you're getting glimpses of messages and meaning as you read into the way they fly together.
ReplyDeleteHi HKatz: Thanks! I do think the birds are somehow fraught with meaning.
ReplyDelete