R. Alan Clanton

Abandoned Rail Grade

The crickets and cicada form a chorus,
everywhere, yet
nowhere...blanketing at times,
tentative at others,
shattering and binding
in blinding fragments of sunlight
so inflamed
with yellow and orange
each beam becomes a red-haired girl
you knew when you were nine.
Nothing of steel remains
of the once narrow gauge—
but the corridor lingers, indelible,
a canopy path
under the outstretched arms of oaks,
stalwart stray pine,
straddling sweetgum, all species
wading, towering over saw palmetto
and silent ferns
in a mute embrace of this gravel berm.
Around us, sandhill and scrub
shimmer in afternoon light,
simmering with the scent of Florida heat,
mossy smells mixing amiably
with magnolia and air bromeliads.
A canyon among trees
both scar and portal, our path
is time travel—we,
passengers bumbling on wings of cicada,
fragile as sepia yellow light.