Week 11

In which we come back around to trains

Welcome to The Public Domain Poetry Project where we deconstruct an older poem by using each line (one per week) as a jumping off point for a brand new poem. Participants are encouraged to share their poems in the comments below, or to leave us a link so we can read them elsewhere. If this sounds like fun to you, please consider subscribing for free so you don’t miss next week’s prompt. Thanks for visiting!

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Here we are at Week 11 of The Public Domain Poetry Project! We’ve reached the next to last line of Edna St. Vincent Millay’s “Travel.” We’re almost there.

This poem seemed a good choice for kicking off this project for a number of reasons. It’s only twelve lines long, and I felt that was about the maximum number of weeks I could commit to for an initial experiment. Also its lines are neither too short nor too long to work well as poetry prompts.

I’ve mentioned before that I loved this poem when I was younger, so sentimentality certainly played a role. (There is another poem by Millay that we used as a reading at our wedding. It was also a strong contender. Maybe next time. Can you guess what it was?)

I think what recommended this poem to me the most was the theme laid out by the title. Travel is a perfect metaphor for a new poetic journey.

This week’s line brings us back around to trains. We haven’t seen the word train since the first line of the second stanza. (“All night there isn't a train goes by”) I made a few different attempts with this prompt but the one that worked out for me began life as an email to my husband.

For nearly as long as we’ve been a couple, my husband has traveled for work. We keep in touch when he’s away by phone and text, but sometimes I still write him emails, particularly when he’s gone longer than usual and there are things happening that I don’t want to forget to tell him about. Travel can be a slog, so I consider myself lucky that he still loves to travel with me, even though it would be very easy to burn out on the whole endeavor.

I’ve never traveled for work, but I love to plan trips for our family. Guidebooks and maps and travel websites are such a thrill. I love every bit of it. There is almost always the kernel of a new adventure in my brain. Lately, and at least partly because of this project, I’ve been thinking about train travel.

Below is this week’s line/prompt, followed by my poem attempt. See you in the comments!

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Yet there isn’t a train I wouldn’t take

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The Note I Wrote to You Over Breakfast While You Were Away

I always think of the trips 
we might take when you
are away from home

You're thinking about 
coming home to me, 
our bed, the garden,
and I'm fantasizing 
about packing a bag

Also, I'm thinking about
how the dehumidifier
in the basement 
stopped working,
which has nothing 
to do with travel
but I didn't want to 
forget to tell you

Then again, if we were
to take a trip we'd want
to make sure the 
dehumidifier was 
working properly 
or we'd come home 
to a very smelly basement
So perhaps it is related

Anyway, I was thinking 
maybe we could
take a trip by train

I know this won't
sound great to you
right now, hard on the
heels of travel delays
and canceled flights,
but give it a day or two

I just like to imagine
us sitting together,
reading our books
and looking up to
watch the fields
and coves go by,
neither of us needing
to watch the road
or read the map

Of course, I would 
still need to follow 
along on a  map, 
but only because 
I am so fond of them

Planes are fine 
when you have 
to get there fast

When the destination 
is more important
than the journey

Like a birthday party, 
a wedding, or a sickbed

But don't you think it strange
that after visiting a place 
we can know it so well,
yet see nothing of the miles
between it and home

Plane travel is like 
the ViewMaster 
I played with as a child
click, there's Paris
click, there's Rome
with nothing but 
blackness in between

But to see all the in-between
spaces, to cross a river 
and then cross it again,
to watch the hills rise 
and the mountains fall away 
into a great stretch
of openness, to be part of 
the landscape along 
the way would be, I think,  
a much better thing

We could go to New York,
or Chicago, or Canada,
if they're still letting us 
cross the border these days

I think there isn't a train
I wouldn't take, but
let's wait until spring
is done before we go
so that we don't 
miss the daffodils

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Thank you all for being here. If you’re interested in catching up up with The Public Domain Poetry Project, here’s a great place to start:

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I also post a poem most weeks at Poetical. Recently I shared a narrative poem about a feat of derring do by my maternal grandfather:

One of the Stories I Know About My Grandfather