He’s a good man, Joseph.
I watch him while he snores,
with his thatch of copper-red hair
and thick freckled arms.
He’s given me three babies now
and me not through my seventeenth year.
I keep them quiet with rag toys
when he’s asleep,
though he’s good-natured enough
with their mischief,
hoisting them on his shoulders and jigging.
He rises and drinks his coffee scalding like lead,
like the hot metal they use to make the rails he rides.
It must be in his veins,
coursing through
the way
he brings the big engine down
the Conemaugh line.
His embrace lifts my feet off the ground.
He chucks my chin like the children’s
but his kiss is only for a wife.
He turns and waves.
I lean into the door frame.
How can a house full of babies feel empty?
My heart keeps time
with the mantel clock
until I hear that train whistle again.
He pulls an extra blast as they near the station
and I know it is just for me,
to tell all the world he loves me,
to tell me he can’t wait to come home.