Premonition

For three days running,
the red lights ticked
as I crossed the tracks,
and no train be coming.

Each day I slow a bit more
as if some switch were thrown,
as if some premonition
overtakes the automatic,

To permit the freights
a right of way.
But perhaps the freights
run perpendicular
to the tracks there,
below the bald hump
of a weathered rise,
down where deer bones
wash from a gully pipe
and eagles take their scavenge
as they may.

Take the crossing quickly,
young friends,
for who’s to know
whose load will spill
on a dull rise,
when the red lights
no longer tick,
when the red lights
abandon all warning –
all warning –
unheeded.

Image: Benjamin Wagner on Unsplash