Rails and Rough Hands Remembered
About Nanna and Home: cutting up the forms
We lie in bed and talk
about our day
or week
or really nothing at all.
Your hands are very rough
as you rub my back.
That means you put in a lot of perms
this week,
the chemicals
eating away at your skin
as you stand all day
on tired feet.
Ready for sleep
you pull the covers
over your head,
I put my bony little-kid knees
in your back
against your ribs.
As we drift off to sleep
it starts to rain
and a train rumbles
on the tracks
across the road.
Roaring away across the road the freight train passes— a hundred cars click-clack click-clack click-clack click-clack over and over and over — so many trains over the years they no longer wake us — four generations in this house have heard these trains — four generations have slept through them.
Rain pounds against the roof — somehow the moonlight still manages to softly illumine the room —I hear you breathing even under the covers — you, the train, the rain, the dark — it’s safety — for the rest of my life few things take me back home like that combination.
©2021, Marilyn Wolf
In response to J.D. Harms’ prompt:
