Red-Eye
Ally
Today, I think I will become a runaway train.
My departure: early Tuesday (long before you wake).
A bleary-footed conductor will scarce miss the tracks,
lurching the distance, escaping, from my stubborn dispatch.
My cars? Locked rooms full of sensitive women.
They take tea from the cart, and are expected by noon
by distant children who haven’t heard the news.
We weep water to steam amid my screws rattling loose.
My eyes will see miles befores yours meet the Sun,
searching to justify what I said in the kitchen
during Monday night’s charading,
your bull-seeing-red and my ruthless butchering.
You will wake, take your coffee and shake off sleep.
I, meantime, will be functioning beyond all reason
pumping reason into crack-coated iron
pistons stained rust-colored and tired.
My absence has been noted, but fret not, precious –
When you reach the door I will be there in pieces,
shaking, paint-flaking, rumbling your home,
My women, voyeuring, peeking through the windows.
My departure: early Tuesday (long before you wake).
A bleary-footed conductor will scarce miss the tracks,
lurching the distance, escaping, from my stubborn dispatch.
My cars? Locked rooms full of sensitive women.
They take tea from the cart, and are expected by noon
by distant children who haven’t heard the news.
We weep water to steam amid my screws rattling loose.
My eyes will see miles befores yours meet the Sun,
searching to justify what I said in the kitchen
during Monday night’s charading,
your bull-seeing-red and my ruthless butchering.
You will wake, take your coffee and shake off sleep.
I, meantime, will be functioning beyond all reason
pumping reason into crack-coated iron
pistons stained rust-colored and tired.
My absence has been noted, but fret not, precious –
When you reach the door I will be there in pieces,
shaking, paint-flaking, rumbling your home,
My women, voyeuring, peeking through the windows.
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Ally (SC '23) is an English/Creative Writing major at Scripps that enjoys words, word-related things, and thing-related words.
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