Traveling Through the Night

When I was a child, I loved traveling by train (I might have mentioned this a time or two). Actually, any mode of transportation would have been fine. I just wanted to see everything I could see and trains seemed like a good way to do that. People don't travel by train as often as they once did and from what I hear from friends who do occasionally, it's an entirely different experience now. But, I still love the idea of traveling through the night, staying awake, as Roethke says, "To see the land I love."


"Night Journey"

Now as the train bears west,
Its rhythm rocks the earth,
And from my Pullman berth
I stare into the night
While others take their rest.
Bridges of iron lace,
A suddenness of trees,
A lap of mountain mist
All cross my line of sight,
Then a bleak wasted place,
And a lake below the knees.
Full on my neck I feel
The straining at a curve;
My muscles move with steel,
I wake in every nerve.
I watch a beacon swing
From dark to blazing bright;
We thunder through ravines
And gullies washed with light.
Beyond the mountain pass
Mist deepens on the pane;
We rush into a rain
That rattles double glass.
Wheels shake the roadbed stone,
The pistons jerk and shove,
I stay up half the night
To see the land I love.

~ Theodore Roethke

I used to collect vintage postcard folders, seeking them out in every antique store I visited. These photos are of just a few of them.