Night Trains

Far off, a distant train rattles against the horizon,
a fast, dark train, carrying missiles to the ships
that lie in wait at dock, their massive gray hulks
sandwiching waves against the creaking bulkheads.

Through the night’s silence, the railroad cars
shudder along steel tracks, shaking the sleeping deer
in their laurel beds, reminding some of the days
when Nike missiles raised furious white fingers
from Sandy Hook’s underground silos, from
secret sites on an unsuspecting mainland.

Fifty years of conflict and skirmish:
a Cold War feared then, a Hot War fought now;
fifty years of running trains through hushed valleys,
low whistles hissing useless warnings.

by Laury A. Egan