4 Southwest Chief/LA Central
(copyrighted material, Coffee House Press)
#4 Southwest Chief/LA Central
FOR DERYA AND HEID
The sheen of incandescent lamppost light travels this rail,
up ahead the Conductor
reminds us, if there’s anything
we can do to make your trip worthless just let us know
and no one cracks a smile.
This Amtrak car glides between
concrete pillars wrapped with steel for quake protection.
Projects plastered in graffiti by day now sink into 9: 00 p.m. comfortable-
this time of night you’d think they were condos
if you rode this rail for the first time.
What I see is concertina riding chain link fence tops-
as if there is an escape attempt due any moment.
Then, somehow, I see myself in the window. Not a reflection
but an actual replica looking back at me and at the glare,
over further than a bounce of light could flash, where
planes coming in to land look like falling stars,
and I’m taking my mother to the asylum in my memory.
I can still hear her saying, bad, bad girl and look
at the pretty stars and Christmas lights sometime late July.
L.A. River on my left, tonight there’s water more than trickle down.
Along the concrete banks where someone wrote out: RECKLESS
a concrete mixer is parked right by the river and rail,
and one single truck has its lights on bright.
By morning, jump-starts will cardiac it back to life.
My gut aches. The whole world’s in a window at Fullerton and
through arches, past electric globes, it spins
high over a Pepsi machine on the floor far below.
Bad, bad girl. Look at the pretty stars and Christmas lights.
FROM OFF-SEASON CITY PIPE, COFFE HOUSE PRESS,2005.
poem by Allison Hedge Coke
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