Railroad

Railroad-spike, tracks and coal,

Mr. great-great grandfather

is still lying cold in a coalmine,

mouth full of soot,

where tunnel collapsed lung and time

his son shoveled the coal

never uncovered his corpse

drank the rails off the tracks,

a union man—off the edge of maps

A fright filled boy ran the track

begging gods to get away

skipped town on the backs

of greyhounds and Amtraks

The free-lunch kids with their hair spiked

on the wrong side of the wrong tracks

Our smoking faces smeared the charcoal

O mother, you threatened lumps of coal for our acts

then came the Scorpio and a heart of coal

arms of tattoos and track marks

his murderous nature mother missed

she went silent and limp at the end of a rusty railroad spike

after the cold fact

I injected a train-wreck in my neck

drowning in the railroad tracks

shoveling coal in the dark places left

A cold railroad spike