WAITING FOR THE TRAINS: VINKOVCI, YUGOSLAVIA

    (October 1986 -- 10:00 p.m.)

Sitting on this wooden bench,
Track Four, Platform Three,
watching trains go by in Vinkovci,
my feet grow cold.

I wonder why I'm here
        among the concrete pillars, the gray black litter
                of the day, the week, the year.

Language crackles through the speakers overhead;
Out in the dark the red lights blink,
        then turn to orange, then to green.
A train comes from somewhere down the line, unseen.

People stir, and bend, and rush to climb aboard;
        a whistle blows, the train glides out.
Unknown lives move forward in the night.

I'm waiting for the train to Austria.
The autumn air is neon-lit.
I put my earphones on and sit . . .
        the music deep inside my brain.
 

A Slavic nose and pointed cap
        asks me for the time.
The man is pointing at his wrist
        he knows I'm not a Yugoslav:
                "Sprechen sie Deutch?" he tries.
                "Govorite li engleski?" I stammer back.

I try to tell him who I am:
                "Je sam Amerikanac."
Of course he doesn't understand.
I wonder how he knew I wasn't one of him.

I lift my wrist, stabbing at my watch,
        and tell him stubbornly
                "Dva deset."
He bends to see what time it is
and shuffles down the track.

More trains arrive . . .
They stop awhile . . .
        and then depart:
                from Munich heading south, to Athens or to Istanbul;
                from Belgrade north to Venice, then to Rome;
                Paris lies a day away.
Curtains drawn -- for privacy or sleep --
        briefly lift as people check
        to see where they have come.
In lighted windows others sit and smoke.
Some compartments open,
        then they close again.
Brakemen . . . with their lanterns lit . . .
        bang their iron hammers on the wheels.
Electric baggage trucks slide up and down.

The whistle sounds; it echoes all along the line;
A minute later each car's coupler jerks,
the wheels begin to turn, the doors all slam,
and I am left behind with still more lives
that have touched me as they passed me by.

On the platforms, waiting people cough and spit.
Women sit among their bags    and bags    and bags.
From the restaurant across the tracks:
        salami and the smell of fried bread crumbs;
        men in dark berets, unshaven, drinking
                tiny cups of coffee, hot and black and sweet;
                shots of brandy, mugs of beer;
        old brown sweaters bag about their bodies,
        well-worn shoes encase their feet.

Lost . . .
I am a soldier of the night
        sent out in darkness,
                music ringing in my ears.
Lost . . .
my family far away,
        I sit among the trains
                in Vinkovci:
        lost in thought,
        lost among the skies,
        lost upon the platforms of the evening,
                in a language that I cannot speak.

Once more light gleams along the rails.
A heavy engine thunders down the track.
Windows flash in front of me
        like moonlit flowers in the night.
For just a moment,     then,         the motion slows . . .
        people mass and break into a run,
        we grab our bags and swing our bodies up and on.

We are "all aboard,"
        whatever language that we speak.

The whistle blows.
        The wheels revolve.
                We have taken to our trains once more.
Zagreb in the evening . . .
        Maribor at four . . .
                across the Alps and into Austria.
The day moves on.

We move as we have always moved,
        along the lines that radiate from centers,
                with every center new as we arrive,

                and strange.

The music moves us as we move,
        bending us in ways
        we only half imagine,
                half enjoy,
the noise of engines
humming in our brains.

Among the freight and baggage of the world
        which I only comprehend in bits and pieces,
                noise and bodies bend by me,
                        leaving years, like fumes, behind.

We make our way;
We make our way;
        the music in our ears.

                                                                         © Anthony Hunt

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