We are riding into the heart

or is it brain of the Pyrénées,

potentially offending the Spaniards

and southwestern French around us

by removing our shoes and consuming

loud carrots in the interior clock

of darkness, afternoon even early evening

evading us, escaping into two holes

like nostrils or great eardrums

where the train has entered, despite

my frantic jabbering Isabelle

has swiftly fallen asleep, noiselessly

her eyes close into their oceans

and she journeys in reverse to 17,

11, eight, a tiny open six,

I can see each of these years

playing across her face still

Italian-tanned and content,

I sense my opening, she wears

my dusty and no longer immaculate jacket

as if I have always been her man,

and I sense the landscape of my caring

rise both green and brown around us,

mountainous and hardy, flat and fertile

where it counts, our feet interlaced

like the electric power-tangle of rail yards,

coupled trains humming to themselves,

mmmmmmmm.

Go to Amazon, get current, and save dough.

FROM THE FORTIFIED STORY VAULT:

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Overcoat, Metro pass, five choice nouns for the task at hand... Ethan Gilsdorf arms himself with words 10/02

At the Planet Hollywood in Paris on September 11 10/01

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Ethan Gilsdorf

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