My Aunt Donna’s little shotgun house huddled by the train crossing, hunched down and worn Honeysuckle grew like kudzu over the walls of an old garage that leaned in the south wind I would pluck a blossom and weave it into my hair, playing princess in a life where no royalty was mine to attain, except princess of poverty Thick black soot smoked through the thick chimney, sending blackened cinders to alight on the honeysuckle and the dog and Donna’s just washed laundry, scrubbed with lye soap When they switched and hitched cars it sounded like heaven crying out in throes of childbirth The conductor leaned far out the window and waved at us as we played in the yard, and we waved back as if he was the President or a king The tracks ran around a curve and headed out over the plains, hooting into the summer wind It was a lonesome sound that made tears come to my child’s eyes, and I never understood why I would watch that miles-long train wind its way, wishing I could climb aboard and chug to places far away from the meals of beans and tatties Chug out to a land where no voices were raised Chug out to someplace that would be insane with riches and wonders and goings-on a child can only imagine a very little bit, but it would be better than the dirty house, the beer bottles and whiskey glasses, and not enough to eat It would take me away to a place where working in the mill or out at Chaney’s Cherry Cannery was not even a distant dream, free from labor so endless and mindless that the brain felt packed in wool and wrapped in a paper bag My tears were for things I only half understood All I know is I remember that train snaking across the prairie in escape to better places and times