PREACHER MAN

H is for almost home!
Down three flights of stairs to the NCS Light Rail.
A car is pulling in. I grab a seat and then see him.
“Brudders and sisters,” the Preacher Man says,
“I am here to tell you the news about heaven …”
He always waits until the car pulls
out of the station before he begins.
“I used to smoke, cheat, steal … Jesus gave me a new …”
You figure it isn’t easy to preach
the word to these bones,
these bones that ride these rails.
The ones who hear him won’t give him
the time of day, so to speak.
The heavenly choir riding
that peace train home
is tuning out the song.
“Jesus came into this world to seek
and to save that which was lost …”
On my fractured CD player,
Marty Robbins sings in my ear.
Yes. El Paso. One of the songs I can’t hear
is about the bad cowboy saved while rustling cattle.
In the song lightning stampedes the herd
and a strike splits a tree into the shape of a cross
and the bad cowboy sees it and is saved from his evil ways.
Kind of reminds me of that Sgt. York movie
when lightning shatters the rifle Alvin is carrying.
Norfolk Street and the Preacher Man’s still going.
I’ve been running in to him for about four years.
A lot of good it did me, eh?
The walking dead are trying to tune him out.

In desperation to get his baritone droning
out of their heads they read the ads posted overhead.
It doesn’t matter that they are written in Spanish
“Su Dinero Cuando Usted Lo Necesita” – make
funny sentences by mixing up the the foreign words.
This must be the 20th time
“from out of nowhere Felina has found me.”
You remember, of course, that I got the CD player to play
more or less – in one ear, depending
on a jostle here and there.
But it’s only playing one song over and over
and I can’t reach down to get it out of my pocket to re-set it.
Here goes the “handsome young
stranger lay dead on the floor.”
My fingers have given up and I’m writing in a fist.
You could wonder – but my hand is asleep
when I need it most.
Preacher Man got off at Bloomfield Avenue.
I hear a lot of buses pass that way.
Our car rattles on to Davenport Avenue
and Branch Brook Station.
Two more modes of transportation,
“then Felina good-bye.”

-- Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved. Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.

From Voices On The Bus, train subway, sidewalk and in my head

OUT THE WINDOW

Sitting on this stupid train
in the middle of nowhere
in New Jersey’s steaming swamp
we ask each other
What’s going on?
And everyone’s clueless.

When the speaker crackles
with the conductor’s voice
you’d swear someone started
an engine that’s already running.
Who knows what he said?

If you got a seat, you hunker down
pretend there’s no one else here
to hear you when you snore.

Standing, you gaze at the nape
of someone standing inches from your face.
You see this guy needs a haircut.
or that guy wears cheap cologne.

Look out the grimy window
if you got one with any kind of view.
Ask why is the sky blue?
How high is up?
How much does the earth weigh?
Did they name it Viagra
to rhyme with Niagara?
Why does one snap always break
on a two-snap leather briefcase?
Will this train ever start moving?

When I get to work
I’m going to look for a new job
where I don’t have to take a train
to get stuck in the mucky meadowlands
to look out the window
at those free-flying birds.
I can hear them laughing at me
and I wish I was anywhere else but here.

- By Anthony Buccino
From VOICES ON THE BUS
Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved.