I couldn't sleep in my seat last night; ended up on the view lounge floor after I heard the conductor come through and tell some other people they could sleep right heree. There. I had watched the dark waters of San Francisco Bay and the lower Sacramento River reflect the lights of civilization along all their shores.
The lower river was a thick mass of ships and docks and lights and bridges. What bridges!! We crossed one before Davis somewhere. I looked to the left, I looked to the right. The river glistened and gleamed in all those industrial lights.
I don't remember Sacramento - I must have been asleep on the floor by then.
But I kept waking. The gibbeous Moon and Jupiter sank step by step each time I stirred and looked outside. Obviously there were not many clouds - if any. After one or two a.m. most of the internal lights in the view lounge were shut off - extinguished - apagado, pues - for the night, and I could then see the ghostly dark fields passing by outside, brushed with gray moonlight.
I ate breakfast in the dining car today. Not too bad. The question of how trains are late is much debated over meals and while watching the scenery go by. In fact, only scenery is a more popular topic than how trains are late. Both seem to rank higher than the usual suspects: who you are, where you're from, where you're going.
The answer is, by the way BTW heh heh looks funny to see btw scribbled in longhand but anyway the answer is that the rails aree owned by the railroad companies - Union Pacific, here - and AMTRAK has negotiated access to those rails, and once you are late, then you are later and later because you keep having to get out of the way for freight trains and domino domino domino all fall down there's a story that a train last week from Seattle to L.A. got into Union Station in Los Angeles TEN HOURS LATE!!!!!!!
But if you just want to sit back and look out the window and eat and drink well, the train is your ticket. Takes longer than an airplane, sureeeeeee, but... bigger seats and you can get up and walk around and drink more. But that has its drawbacks, you know, if you get drunk, I mean, the train is already rocking back and forth all by itself, and then....
Well, you catch my drift even if I am seriously rewriting this day aftertomorrow at the computer coffeehouse on whatever the hell street it is in downtown Seattle I will finally get there, yes, only two hours late night before lassttssss
Ooops. She saw the box. Meow.
Where was I look back at my notebook...
Oh yes. Yes. Yesterday. Yesterday's ride from Los Angeles up the coast. Oh man that was splendid. Splendidly scenic. The hills and valleys, and then the BEACHhhhhhhh along Ventura, Santa Barbara, oh my god how pretty!
Then more beach and we went onward twisting around through the secret rocket base at Vandenburg, a piece of coast you can only see from the train, the vast stretches of empty hillsides falling into the sea, punctuated by little valleys with rusting rocket-launcing platforms and others not so rusty but no, no one exploded an h-bomb today so good enough I am still writing and rewriting tomorrow and the day after that yes wondering when you are reading....
Yesterrday all day all I wanted to do was stare out the window and talk with a guy I met who is absolutely insane and a delight to chatter with. Let's call him Mister K, okay? I really hope I see him again, soon. He was taking a break after working his butt off for the academy wingding last week. After a while I showed him some of my poems and he agreed that the AVENIDA BRIDGE MEXICO is a little too cute but he really liked the one about the camote vendor mmmm I wonder if I got that one online heree PHIL PLEASE CHECK IT OUT, eh? [okei, but only the bridge is there, Dano]
In Salinas we stood outside smoking during a smoke break and he told me he remembered the camotero. You see, he has a shack down along the coast of Baja California and sails his boat into La Paz and toward Loreto so of course he knows all about sweep potatoes yes.
But he got off at Chemult to meet his kid and grandkids. And the train has gone on without him now. I switched seats after asking the car boss and now I have a table to write on, which is much better maybe I'll actually get more done now
except all I want to do is look out the window
pretty scenery
we crawled up the upper Sacramento River this morning
past cabins and old shacks
the river twisting and turning around and around
breaking and rushing over rocks and between trees
goodlooking fish stream
said the man from Colorado
WHEN's the next damn smoking stop
said Mister K.
We rolled past Mount Shasta but you couldn't see it much
because of the clouds
just steep slopes going up and disappearing into the heavens
and the ground covered with snow
Klamath Lake wass hugeeeeeeee
vast sea of water ruffled by the wind
and then Mister K got off.
Sure hope I run into him again.
What a small world to run into a Mexico lover who likes poetry....
We have climbed higher, into snow covered trees.
I look up from my notebook to see snow covered trees.
And more snow covered trees. We are climbing higher.
The trees get taller and more snow covered, and more and more
until they are vast bending forests
of white with only the tiniest bits
of green showing through
but it isn't green it's only grey black
compared to the brilliance of the white
Weird. Really weirdly bbbbeeeeaaaaauuuutifulllll
I am going up to the view lounge to see more.
Even if it means that I write less.
whoa plunging car
walk forward through
d o o r s
find a seat
I'm theree now. I wish we were online so I could show you
right
now this....
this mass of white weirdness
t h e n
We pass through a TUNNELLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL
long dark
dark
and have emerged onto the rim of a canyon
WE DRIFT THHROOUGH whiteness
clinging to the tops of the mountains
high above
high above what?
the canyon deep
walls of white plunging down
weird, tree-shaped white.............
make it into verses, Daniel
get Phillllip and Mikey to respect your lines
breaking out from paper page into electronic
and line breaks like I Ching
open or closed
see that sign by the side of the tracks that says 541
that's how many railroad miles we have come from San Francisco
the tunnel back there wass between east and west Oregon
white white white snow covered trees
unbelievable spikes and feathers
snow making everything whiiiiiiiiite
and deep canyon gulfs that open in the blink of your eye
don't look away - you'll miss it
oh reader what I give up for my obsession
I hope you get ssommeeeething out of this
well, I am sleeping underr mental quilts of snow
in our nice, warm, rattling train carrrrrrrrrrrr
mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
already hungry for lunch
We're back down into green trees again. Sorry, but I had to stop writing.
The smell of food in the dining car
this text cooks while I order lunch
outside the window streaming view of greennnnnnnnn
Into the Willamette Valley for lunch however you spell it
Later. Afternoon highballing along north toward Portland.
Turn away from the road, poet,
look out the other window.
Green farmland, red barns
Scattered trees
silent cows
river
bridge
I am alreaddy thinking about dinner.
Abandoned cars in back yards. Big back yards
surrounded by fields and orchards.
Country roads.
Old farmhouses.
Mother with baby walking carefully in the lounge car hallway.
All around her, on every side, fields and trees rush by.
Oh yes she walks carefully rock & roll
rock & roll
rock & roll
rattle creak scrape
maybe 60 mph
my pen flies across paper
scribble scribble scrawl
trying not to look down at this page
horse in corral
looks
at
us
g o
b y
then
c
u
r
v e
slow down train
then s t r a i g h t
speed up again
waxing gibbeous moon emerges
from afternoon cloud h o r i z o n
dinner will be served AFTER Portland Oregon
little cars scurry
across the fields
along invisible highway
p e r s p e c t i v e
is that
an airport ?
yes............................................
.........................................
long, light, painted stripe
distant hangars
a small town airport
We stop at Salem.
I wonder how many more stops before we get to Portland
I wonder how many more stops before we get to Portland
and will we get there before SUN SET
I want to see the city in fading light.
and will we get there before SUN SET
I want to see the city in fading light.
I do not want to write any more
later
oh my God look at that the whole river falls over a waterfall just like Florence in the cafe car said it would....
and there, by the shore, a metal shed for rent...
ah, industrial art
we are coming into the city. The freeway struggles nearby. We roll on past it all, until...
we must stop and wait for another freight train.
*sigh*
Hitler made the trains run on time. thank God we are a democracy
I, for one, don't care. I like to ride AMTRAK
or was that Mussolini? Out there in his SUV struggling to drive into Portland?
I will smoke a cigarette on the platform under the flashing neon sign that says
TAKE THE TRAIN
oh yes. and tonight, sometime, I will arrive in Seattle.