Ann Christine Tabaka’s most recent poem to appear here was “The Blink of an Eye” (April 2018).

One More Ride
By Ann Christine Tabaka

Father worked the rails. Free
passage was our right. Hours
rocking back and forth to the
constant rhythm of the train.

Foreheads pressed to cool
fuliginous windows, scenery
streaming by at a giddying pace.
Large cities, small towns,
virescent farm land, all ablur.

The somnolent clickety-clack
of wheels motoring onward.
Miles of track laid north to
south, east to west. Once the
lifeblood of transportation.

Memories, hard and soft now
collide, as once great escapades
also blur in my aging mind. One
more ride, yes one more ride,
and I shall soon be home.