Trains

Marking the hours of the night,

Carrying freight of coal and cotton,

People going to other places.

As a child the whistles comforted me,

Standing sentry out my window.

Holding crocodiles, strangers, monsters,

And other childhood Gollums at bay.

Bed times stories told in clicks and clacks,

Punctuated by cooing whistle.

Diesel and steam, tanker and caboose,

Fairy tales of hobos and Whos.

I cannot stay where there are no tracks,

Nothing rumbling through my dreams.

I need to know that they are there,

Protecting me from the shades of my mind.

Five-hundred miles and four states distant,

I again sleep with the trains.

Piercing through night and day,

Morphine whistles bringing Sandman.