Sue Landers
A Train Refrain
train
as vehicle as music
train as ritual
as flag
train as timepiece
a marker
train as geometry
or frame
train as
library, memory
train as flight
and dive
train is as a cormorant,
as lung, hook, and eye
train as the train is a train easing into its terminal
where a woman says you can be whatever you wanna be at the beach.
An Alphabet Like Breath We Forget
B train from Church Ave to Bedford Park Blvd
The train as alphabet,
routine,
like breath
you forget
until in variation,
you receive the gift of it—
language. A city.
The Bronx in the rain,
a song
sung from cliffs.
In the glint of slick brick and stacks,
a fish fry, fedora.
The Bronx in the rain
calls me señora,
is comidas criollas,
próximo-next.
The Bronx in the rain
a definite article
a house of the holy comforter.
The one who climbs
all day long big sky
and boulder,
a continent’s eruption,
perpetually
praising
its angels.
Express Roulette
D train from Atlantic Ave to Norwood-205 Street
| the doors open |
and it’s a beautiful day for a game
| the doors open |
a game of striking and fielding and rounding
of running around and around to get home
| the doors open |
and a man says he’s tired of sleeping on the train
| the doors open |
it’s showtime
| the doors open |
and a stranger asks me if I have children
and I stop myself from telling her
I was so busy working I hardly noticed when the blood
stopped pouring from my body
how far away I was from the workings of my body
while I was working in a city full of bodies moving like a hurricane
| the doors open |
and the streets are flooded in Houston
| the doors open |
and people are waving from rooftops
| the doors open |
and a president is pardoning a cop who webcast women in bathrooms
the women arrested for not being born here
for coming into a country of men
who’ve been excused over and over again
| the doors open |
and a man in an I'm-not-arguing-I'm-just-explaining-I'm-right t-shirt
tells me I wouldn’t know what it was like
in Bensonhurst or Arthur Avenue after,
he says, they let them in
| the doors open |
and a woman asks me for help with her naturalization test
she asks me to read aloud the words:
Would you be willing to bear arms for this country?
| the doors open |
and it is so much work to be always in progress—
this experiment, the flames
| the doors open |
and a girl is splayed on the platform knees in the air
someone moves in to look or to help
and a cop touches them
and they flinch
| the doors open |
and a nurse is arrested for not allowing a cop to take blood
from a patient without a warrant
| the doors open |
and the president wants to sell military equipment to the police
| the doors open |
and smoke seeps from the walls of the consulates
| the doors open |
and bots sow seeds of discord—parasites in hearts negated
| the doors open |
and someone says they can’t watch the news anymore
| the doors, they open |
on so many an American pastime