The Bombay Train Song

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1. Bombay In your bosom we wake up with fear, In your sky there’s only unending tears, You always roar, but within, Hangs silence like a shroud of death. You are rocked, periodically, by bombs, Yet, we go about our business, As if nothing happened, all’s well, Are we too dazed to protest? In your hungry, convoluted […]...
2. Song of a Train A monster taught To come to hand Amain, As swift as thought Across the land The train. The song it sings Has an iron sound; Its iron wings Like wheels go round. Crash under bridges, Flash over ridges, And vault the downs; The road is straight Nor stile, nor gate; For milestones towns! Voluminous, vanishing, […]...
3. Yet Gentle Will the Griffin Be (What Grandpa told the Children) The moon? It is a griffin’s egg, Hatching to-morrow night. And how the little boys will watch With shouting and delight To see him break the shell and stretch And creep across the sky. The boys will laugh. The little girls, I fear, may hide and cry. Yet gentle will […]...
4. The Song of Quoodle They haven’t got no noses, The fallen sons of Eve; Even the smell of roses Is not what they supposes; But more than mind discloses And more than men believe. They haven’t got no noses, They cannot even tell When door and darkness closes The park a Jew encloses, Where even the law of Moses […]...
5. A Song at Cock-Crow The first time that Peter denied his Lord He shrank from the cudgel, the scourge and the cord, But followed far off to see what they would do, Till the cock crew till the cock crew After Gethsemane, till the cock crew! The first time that Peter denied his Lord ‘Twas only a maid in […]...
6. Rondeau at the Train Stop It bothers me: the genital smell of the bay Drifting toward me on the T stop, the train Circling the city like a dingy, year-round Christmas display. The Puritans were right! Sin Is everywhere in Massachusetts, hell-bound In the population. it bothers me Because it’s summer now and sticky – no rain To cool things […]...
7. Train Ride After rain, through afterglow, the unfolding fan Of railway landscape sidled onthe pivot Of a larger arc into the green of evening; I remembered that noon I saw a gradual bud Still white; though dead in its warm bloom; Always the enemy is the foe at home. And I wondered what surgery could recover Our […]...
8. Train Ride For Horace Gregory After rain, through afterglow, the unfolding fan Of railway landscape sidled onthe pivot Of a larger arc into the green of evening; I remembered that noon I saw a gradual bud Still white; though dead in its warm bloom; Always the enemy is the foe at home. And I wondered what surgery […]...
9. The Song of the Shirt With fingers weary and worn, With eyelids heavy and red, A woman sat, in unwomanly rags, Plying her needle and thread Stitch! stitch! stitch! In poverty, hunger, and dirt, And still with a voice of dolorous pitch She sang the “Song of the Shirt.” “Work! work! work! While the cock is crowing aloof! And work […]...
10. Clothes Put on a clean shirt Before you die, some Russian said. Nothing with drool, please, No egg spots, no blood, No sweat, no sperm. You want me clean, God, So I’ll try to comply. The hat I was married in, Will it do? White, broad, fake flowers in a tiny array. It’s old-fashioned, as stylish […]...
11. Saving a Train ‘Twas in the year of 1869, and on the 19th of November, Which the people in Southern Germany will long remember, The great rain-storm which for twenty hours did pour down, That the rivers were overflowed and petty streams all around. The rain fell in such torrents as had never been seen before, That it […]...
12. The Centenarians I asked of ancient gaffers three The way of their ripe living, And this is what they told to me Without Misgiving. The First: ‘The why I’ve lived so long, To my fond recollection Is that for women, wine and song I’ve had a predilection. Full many a bawdy stave I’ve sung With wenches of […]...
13. He forgot and I remembered He forgot and I remembered ‘Twas an everyday affair Long ago as Christ and Peter “Warmed them” at the “Temple fire.” “Thou wert with him” quoth “the Damsel”? “No” said Peter, ’twasn’t me Jesus merely “looked” at Peter Could I do aught else to Thee?...
14. Animals Are Passing From Our Lives It’s wonderful how I jog On four honed-down ivory toes My massive buttocks slipping Like oiled parts with each light step. I’m to market. I can smell The sour, grooved block, I can smell The blade that opens the hole And the pudgy white fingers That shake out the intestines Like a hankie. In my […]...
15. Dream Song 30: Collating bones: I would have liked to do Collating bones: I would have liked to do. Henry would have been hot at that. I missed his profession. As a little boy I always thought ‘I’m an archeologist’; who Could be more respected peaceful serious than that? Hell talkt my brain awake. Bluffed to the ends of me pain & I took up a […]...
16. In the Train AS we rush, as we rush in the Train, The trees and the houses go wheeling back, But the starry heavens above the plain Come flying on our track. All the beautiful stars of the sky, The silver doves of the forest of Night, Over the dull earth swarm and fly, Companions of our flight. […]...
17. A Song For Mercy, Courage, Kindness, Mirth, There is no measure upon earth. Nay, they wither, root and stem, If an end be set to them. Overbrim and overflow, If you own heart you would know; For the spirit born to bless Lives but in its own excess...
18. The Buried Train Tell me about the train that people say got buried By the avalanche was it snow? It was In Colorado, and no one saw it happen. There was smoke from the engine curling up Lightly through fir tops, and the engine sounds. There were all those people reading some From Thoreau, some from Henry Ward […]...
19. Train Train. Distant Train. Praise the glorious distance of Train. Dogs bark, reply to the mournful echo of Train’s whistle. Train looks back, keeps moving. Train carries its boxcars of secrets further and further away (and even further still) from those who profess to love Train, but who do not run after him. Eyes brimmed with […]...
20. Song of the Son Pour O pour that parting soul in song O pour it in the sawdust glow of night Into the velvet pine-smoke air tonight, And let the valley carry it along. And let the valley carry it along. O land and soil, red soil and sweet-gum tree, So scant of grass, so proligate of pines, Now […]...
21. One Train May Hide Another (sign at a railroad crossing in Kenya) In a poem, one line may hide another line, As at a crossing, one train may hide another train. That is, if you are waiting to cross The tracks, wait to do it for one moment at Least after the first train is gone. And so when you […]...
22. Toilet Seats While I am emulating Keats My brother fabrics toilet seats, The which, they say, are works of art, Aesthetic features of the mart; So exquisitely are they made With plastic of a pastel shade, Of topaz, ivory or rose, Inviting to serene repose. Rajahs I’m told have seats of gold, (They must, I fear, be […]...
23. The shut-eye train Come, my little one, with me! There are wondrous sights to see As the evening shadows fall; In your pretty cap and gown, Don’t detain The Shut-Eye train – “Ting-a-ling!” the bell it goeth, “Toot-toot!” the whistle bloweth, And we hear the warning call: “All aboard for Shut-Eye Town!” Over hill and over plain Soon […]...
24. Song on the End of the World On the day the world ends A bee circles a clover, A Fisherman mends a glimmering net. Happy porpoises jump in the sea, By the rainspout young sparrows are playing And the snake is gold-skinned as it it should always be. On the day the world ends Women walk through fields under their umbrellas A […]...
25. Road-Song of the Bandar-Log (From The Jungle Book) Here we go in a flung festoon, Half-way up to the jealous moon! Don’t you envy our pranceful bands? Don’t you wish you had extra hands? Would n’t you like if your tails were so Curved in the shape of a Cupid’s bow? Now you’re angry, but never mind, Brother, thy […]...
26. Punch Song Four elements, joined in Harmonious strife, Shadow the world forth, And typify life. Into the goblet The lemon’s juice pour; Acid is ever Life’s innermost core. Now, with the sugar’s All-softening juice, The strength of the acid So burning reduce. The bright sparkling water Now pour in the bowl; Water all-gently Encircles the whole. Let […]...
27. Like The Train's Beat Like the train’s beat Swift language flutters the lips Of the Polish airgirl in the corner seat, The swinging and narrowing sun Lights her eyelashes, shapes Her sharp vivacity of bone. Hair, wild and controlled, runs back: And gestures like these English oaks Flash past the windows of her foreign talk. The train runs on […]...
28. On The Night Train Have you seen the bush by moonlight, from the train, go running by? Blackened log and stump and sapling, ghostly trees all dead and dry; Here a patch of glassy water; there a glimpse of mystic sky? Have you heard the still voice calling – yet so warm, and yet so cold: “I’m the Mother-Bush […]...
29. I thought the Train would never come I thought the Train would never come How slow the whistle sang I don’t believe a peevish Bird So whimpered for the Spring I taught my Heart a hundred times Precisely what to say Provoking Lover, when you came Its Treatise flew away To hide my strategy too late To wiser be too soon For […]...
30. A train went through a burial gate A train went through a burial gate, A bird broke forth and sang, And trilled, and quivered, and shook his throat Till all the churchyard rang; And then adjusted his little notes, And bowed and sang again. Doubtless, he thought it meet of him To say good-by to men....
31. Dream Song 50: In a motion of night they massed nearer my post In a motion of night they massed nearer my post. I hummed a short blues. When the stars went out I studied my weapons system. Grenades, the portable rack, the yellow spout Of the anthrax-ray: in order. Yes, and most Of my pencils were sharp. This edge of the galaxy has often seen A defence […]...
32. Anchor Song Heh! Walk her round. Heave, ah heave her short again! Over, snatch her over, there, and hold her on the pawl. Loose all sail, and brace your yards back and full Ready jib to pay her off and heave short all! Well, ah fare you well; we can stay no more with you, my love […]...
33. My Papa's Waltz The whiskey on your breath Could make a small boy dizzy; But I hung on like death: Such waltzing was not easy. We romped until the pans Slid from the kitchen shelf; My mother’s countenance Could not unfrown itself. The hand that held my wrist Was battered on one knuckle; At every step you missed […]...
34. I Ask You What scene would I want to be enveloped in More than this one, An ordinary night at the kitchen table, Floral wallpaper pressing in, White cabinets full of glass, The telephone silent, A pen tilted back in my hand? It gives me time to think About all that is going on outside Leaves gathering in […]...
35. The Death and Last Confession of Wandering Peter When Peter Wanderwide was young He wandered everywhere he would: All that he approved was sung, And most of what he saw was good. When Peter Wanderwide was thrown By Death himself beyond Auxerre, He chanted in heroic tone To priests and people gathered there: “If all that I have loved and seen Be with […]...
36. Song IV: Draw Near and Behold Me Love is enough: draw near and behold me Ye who pass by the way to your rest and your laughter, And are full of the hope of the dawn coming after; For the strong of the world have bought me and sold me And my house is all wasted from threshold to rafter. Pass by […]...
37. I don't remember the word I wished to say I don’t remember the word I wished to say. The blind swallow returns to the hall of shadow, On shorn wings, with the translucent ones to play. The song of night is sung without memory, though. No birds. No blossoms on the dried flowers. The manes of night’s horses are translucent. An empty boat drifts […]...
38. Siren Song I phone from time to time, to see if she’s Changed the music on her answerphone. ‘Tell me in two words’, goes the recording, ‘what you were going to tell in a thousand’. I peer into that thought, like peering out To sea at night, hearing the sound of waves Breaking on rocks, knowing she […]...
39. Tz'u No. 11 To the tune of “Lamentation” It was far into the night when, intoxicated, I took off my ornaments; The plum flower withered in my hair. Recovered from tipsiness, The lingering smell of wine Broke my fond dream Before my dreaming soul could find My way home. All is quiet. The moon lingers, And the emerald […]...
40. Desmond's Song By the Feal’s wave benighted, No star in the skies, To thy door by Love lighted, I first saw those eyes. Some voice whisper’d o’er me, As the threshold I cross’d, There was ruin before me, If I loved, I was lost. Love came, and brought sorrow Too soon in his train; Yet so sweet, […]...