The Railway Train

I like to see it lap the miles, And lick the valleys up, And stop to feed itself at tanks; And then, prodigious, step Around a pile of mountains, And, supercilious, peer In shanties by the sides of roads; And then a quarry pare To fit its sides, and crawl between, Complaining all the while In horrid, hooting stanza; Then chase itself down the hill And neigh like Boanerges; Then, punctual as a star, Stop – docile and omnipotent – At its own stable door.