a southbound Amtrak

a southbound Amtrak
passenger and mail train gone
when the windows clear



From an NPR news story some time in the early 1990s. One evening I turned on my car radio and the words in the poem were the first thing I heard. Submitted by John Maruskin.

Sinkhole

One of life's greatest certainties
is that the ground is solid
beneath one's feet

so the sudden appearance
of chasms, however small,
is unsettling.




From British sinkhole spike prompts warning, David Shukman, BBC News. Submitted by Angi Holden.

The burn

Boredom makes us do it, that and the chase.
The sun whitens the grass until it's ripe
to burn and then we light it, watch and wait.

The flames take the land, they come and we run.
Us in our shorts, them in their gear, too
clumsy to run but fast because they're men.

We're laughing and falling, stumbling and rolling
safe if not caught, too young to worry
about the dead birds and black landscape.



From Gawain Barnard's photography exhibition, as previewed on A Fine Beginning: Made in Wales, BBC News In Pictures, 14 March 2014. Words omitted: 'and then' (line 4), 'and' (7), 'from the burn' (8), 'broken land' (9). Submitted by Gabriel Smy.