Classic Poem

Alone in the basement,
I would sometimes lower one eye
to the level of the narrow track of the model train

to watch the puffing locomotive
pull the cars around a curve
then bear down on me with its dazzling eye.

What was in those moments
before I lifted my head and let the train
go rocking by under my nose?

I remember not caring much
about the fake grass or the buildings
that made up the miniature town.

The same went for the station and its master,
the crossing gates and flashing lights,
the milk car, the pencil-size logs,

the metallic men and women,
the dangling water tower,
and the round mirror for a pond.

All I wanted was to be blinded
over and over by this shaking light
as the train stuck fast to its oval course.

Or better still, to close my eyes,
to stay there on the cold narrow rails
and let the train tunnel through me

the way-it-tunneled through the mountain
that was painted the color of rock,
and then there would be nothing

but the long whistling through the dark—
no basement, no boy,
no everlasting summer afternoon.

From Poetry Magazine, Vol. 185, no. 2, Nov. 2004. Used with permission.