Trying To Name What Doesn’t Change Poem by Naomi Shihab Nye

Trying To Name What Doesn’t Change

Rating: 4.0


Roselva says the only thing that doesn’t change
is train tracks. She’s sure of it.
The train changes, or the weeds that grow up spidery
by the side, but not the tracks.
I’ve watched one for three years, she says,
and it doesn’t curve, doesn’t break, doesn’t grow.

Peter isn’t sure. He saw an abandoned track
near Sabinas, Mexico, and says a track without a train
is a changed track. The metal wasn’t shiny anymore.
The wood was split and some of the ties were gone.

Every Tuesday on Morales Street
butchers crack the necks of a hundred hens.
The widow in the tilted house
spices her soup with cinnamon.
Ask her what doesn’t change.

Stars explode.
The rose curls up as if there is fire in the petals.
The cat who knew me is buried under the bush.

The train whistle still wails its ancient sound
but when it goes away, shrinking back
from the walls of the brain,
it takes something different with it every time.

COMMENTS OF THE POEM
Dr Antony Theodore 20 April 2019

Stars explode. The rose curls up as if there is fire in the petals. The cat who knew me is buried under the bush. very fine and great poem. tony

0 1 Reply
Seamus O Brian 19 February 2018

Perfection in contemporary verse.

0 1 Reply
Houda Boukassoula 19 February 2018

a track without a train is a changed track. The metal wasn’t shiny anymore. The wood was split and some of the ties were gone. A great poetic picture.In fact there's nothing on Earth that remains the same forever even the least noticeable details change though we don't usuallypay attention to them

0 1 Reply
READ THIS POEM IN OTHER LANGUAGES
Naomi Shihab Nye

Naomi Shihab Nye

St. Louis, Missouri
Close
Error Success