Riding the Comet

                                                             (photo by Rodger Kingston)

 Two power cars and a coach—

a machined aluminum tube

varnished against corrosion.

Riding the Comet from Boston

to Providence unsettles me

since this is a ghost train scrapped

when I was only five years old.

A few dry skeletons crumpled

in faded upholstery smelling

of mold and last century’s mice.

As the only living passenger

I huddle in the rear in case

this flimsy speedster crashes.

But ghost trains almost never crash.

And they rarely stop at stations

like Back Bay, which flashes past

in symmetries of concrete platforms.

Then underground to Forest Hills,

slinking along to Readville,

then raging over the marshland,

the Neponset River a flash

of gray. Then past Norfolk without

a pang of conscience. Canton, Sharon,

Foxboro and other suburbs

hardly crease my mental map.

We rip across the state line

and pierce a hole through Pawtucket.

At last I detrain from the dream

with Rhode Island’s snowy tombstone

of a state house hovering nearby.

Panting smuts of diesel exhaust,

the Comet departs in the mist.

I join myself in a café where                                                 

I describe my railroad journey

with respect for the disbelief

self and other have in common.

Did that ghost train actually run?

That gleam of aluminum banded

with two shades of blue enamel

could be seen as winter light

refreshed and refreshing itself

in a corner of our mutual eye.

That Gioconda Moment

The crowd of tourists facing

the Mona Lisa congeals

into a gray singularity.

I’ve never trusted that painting,

or Pater’s glib description,

which Yeats rewrote into verse.

The smile looks slightly manic,

the potato face seems rooted

in clammy earthen desires.

You expect me to worship

with those who look upon art

as the savior of their passions.

You want me to snap a selfie

with that fatuous smile askew

with a thousand old platitudes.

Look at the landscape looming

teary with mist behind her.

The trees look pubic, the streams

flowing through mythic places

one would rather read about

than visit while still in one’s skin.

That landscape is the part of her

Leonardo declined to paint

even to amuse her husband.

You know about such body parts,

and have cherished your own despite

the patina age has imposed.

The painting simmers with lust

that the lanky hairdo defies.

The wrinkled clothing is the shell

of the subject’s private self,

which you dare me to reveal

by blowing the portrait a kiss.

A Great Leaf

Spouting from a flower-box,

a leaf three feet across waves

at passersby, threatening

or promising to enfold them

in green thoughts otherwise

available only in verse.

Most people ignore this plant

flexing its leaf like a muscle,

but I want to hear it fluster

in gusts of tropical rain blown

thousands of miles from the Gulf

up the Mississippi valley.

I can’t tell if the faint shiver

rippling across this massive leaf

is a farewell or some other thought.

Maybe it’s just enjoying itself

in that semi-sexual way that plants

stretch and preen in the sunlight.

Maybe I could learn something

from tissue more sensitive than mine,

something about touching more gently.

But you’re eager to collect the mail

and learn from cold print how deeply

debt plumbs us, how near the bottom.

When frost arrives and this leaf falls

the village will sigh with relief.

You laugh and drag me away,

leaving the whole plant fluttering

as if some microaggression

has soiled its perfect green day.