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by Geoff Baker

We burned and shuddered steady on
like sleek metallic shells
of heated sheets and rivets,
numbed around the edges,
through the steelblack midnight shadows.

And every breath that we let go
was coal-burn smoke,
stacked up and hot
from underneath our hoods
in clouds of steam,
of locomotive respiration.

And I talked around,
about everything,
and took you home,
moved you,
through the night,
safe & sound,
at a hundred iron miles an hour.