i dreamt on the train something where
in waking up to four new voices i learned
their people instantly
and i could watch them sway with the train
standing over our seats smiling
giving us pats on the shoulder though
the sun hadn’t come out yet

it was vain of me to think they meant to
absolve me of my rutted existence in omaha,
lincoln, or the inbetween place called interstate.
they were tender dream born nests
with hushing mouths, oil on marble
were they not my own creation, though?
how vain is that? i wondered, sitting forward

as i woke and stretched against the ceiling
with the quiet air still shushing from its vents
almost smelling like ghost almonds, almost
i stepped off the seat, over your still,
half-slumbering blanketed body and
walked to the back of it. how did i miss
that we were in the last car?

the tracks fell away behind us
into an acute angle quitting at the
straight plane of horizon and daybreak
making itself out on the left
i registered new voices then, i thought
they had figured me, and set me up, finally
to be absolved as i had wished

to construct the community
of those still sleeping and set them by
and crammed   my eyes against the window
pulling relief from an understanding
of distance
i am so shocked at the newness
of being gently rocked down

the narrow track. oh! i saw my first early
riser with his feet on the ground, pulling the
hood of a semi up with the arc of his elbow
but just for a moment as we rake
 the flat alteredness of hay fields,
pasture, and feeding lot