This is a pair of poems called "American Sketches"
and they deal with Midwestern scenes.
If you go through Kansas and see how flat it is,
you know there have to be mountains somewhere
and that it would be nice to get to them--
Some of you must have got through Kansas
to have got this far West.
But the first one is called "Crossing Kansas by Train."
The telephone poles have been holding their arms
out a long time now to birds that will not settle there
but pass with strange cawings westward
to where dark trees gather about a water hole this is Kansas
the mountains start here just behind the closed
eyes of a farmer's sons asleep in their work clothes.
And the other one is called "Poem to Be Read at 3 A.M."
There's a place name in this poem, Ladora, which is--
or used to be-- a small town in Iowa
that formerly was on the principal East/West highway.
And I passed through it many times late at night.
The last time I was driving through that part
of the country, a new interstate highway
had been built through and at the place approximately
where I remember Ladora, those sort of bright, green signs
with white lettering.
There were three town names, one of which
appeared to be a Ladora, but it had
been Xed stopped by a large adhesive tape.
So I didn't know how to get there anymore even
if I'd wanted to go.
But if you know Iowa, maybe the town of Ladora,
maybe you could still find it if you looked for it.
This poem is about getting through it, though, at 3:00 AM.
Excepting the diner on the outskirts
the town of Ladora at 3:00 AM was
dark but for my headlights and up in one second-story room
a single light where someone was sick
or perhaps reading as I drove past at seventy not thinking
this poem is for whoever had the light on.