The Broken Down Train Station

It’s the hottest tourist spot.
Gargoyles hold torches
that have been lit since the sun split.

The moon balloons like a wounded eye.

The few trains that remain
wallow in their company,
and sit motionless on disjointed tracks
that often end nowhere.

There’s a girl with beach blonde hair
who touches everything she passes.

Carnival lights rim the derelict doorway,
colored purple, blue, and marble gray,
guiding first time lookers on inside,
though the bricks have mostly been stripped,
and children go in and out where they please.

All the windows have been shot out,
the probable victim of a swarm of stones,
or maybe some emotional shoot-out,
where the winner walked away with it all.
The loser must not have gone very far.

Someone has burned down the mailroom.
The shelves are disheveled,
and a smell of burnt pine is in the air.

There’s a girl with beach blonde hair
who holds everything she passes

in the warmth of her breast.

Every now and then,
a train whistle stabs at the stars,
and everyone gathers around
to guess at the cause.

Cameras start clicking
in a blinding affair,
before everyone packs up
and the station burns out.

Still the trains sit, rooted to the dark,
how could they move with hearts as their cargo?