One Train May Hide Another, Kenneth Koch

One Train May Hide Another

(sign at a railroad crossing in Kenya)

  In a poem, one line may hide another line,
  As at a crossing, one train may hide another train.
  That is, if you are waiting to cross
  The tracks, wait to do it for one moment at
  Least after the first train is gone. And so when you read
  Wait until you have read the next line--
  Then it is safe to go on reading.
  In a family one sister may conceal another,
  So, when you are courting, it's best to have them all in view
  Otherwise in coming to find one you may love another.
  One father or one brother may hide the man,
  If you are a woman, whom you have been waiting to love.
  So always standing in front of something the other
  As words stand in front of objects, feelings, and ideas.
  One wish may hide another. And one person's reputation may hide
  The reputation of another. One dog may conceal another
  On a lawn, so if you escape the first one you're not necessarily safe;
  One lilac may hide another and then a lot of lilacs and on the Appia
       Antica one tomb
  May hide a number of other tombs. In love, one reproach may hide another,
  One small complaint may hide a great one.
  One injustice may hide another--one colonial may hide another,
  One blaring red uniform another, and another, a whole column. One bath
       may hide another bath
  As when, after bathing, one walks out into the rain.
  One idea may hide another: Life is simple
  Hide Life is incredibly complex, as in the prose of Gertrude Stein
  One sentence hides another and is another as well. And in the laboratory
  One invention may hide another invention,
  One evening may hide another, one shadow, a nest of shadows.
  One dark red, or one blue, or one purple--this is a painting
  By someone after Matisse. One waits at the tracks until they pass,
  These hidden doubles or, sometimes, likenesses. One identical twin
  May hide the other. And there may be even more in there! The obstetrician
  Gazes at the Valley of the Var. We used to live there, my wife and I, but
  One life hid another life. And now she is gone and I am here.
  A vivacious mother hides a gawky daughter. The daughter hides
  Her own vivacious daughter in turn. They are in
  A railway station and the daughter is holding a bag
  Bigger than her mother's bag and successfully hides it.
  In offering to pick up the daughter's bag one finds oneself confronted by
       the mother's
  And has to carry that one, too. So one hitchhiker
  May deliberately hide another and one cup of coffee
  Another, too, until one is over-excited. One love may hide another love
       or the same love
  As when "I love you" suddenly rings false and one discovers
  The better love lingering behind, as when "I'm full of doubts"
  Hides "I'm certain about something and it is that"
  And one dream may hide another as is well known, always, too. In the
       Garden of Eden
  Adam and Eve may hide the real Adam and Eve.
  Jerusalem may hide another Jerusalem.
  When you come to something, stop to let it pass
  So you can see what else is there. At home, no matter where,
  Internal tracks pose dangers, too: one memory
  Certainly hides another, that being what memory is all about,
  The eternal reverse succession of contemplated entities. Reading 
      A Sentimental Journey look around
  When you have finished, for Tristram Shandy, to see
  If it is standing there, it should be, stronger
  And more profound and theretofore hidden as Santa Maria Maggiore
  May be hidden by similar churches inside Rome. One sidewalk
  May hide another, as when you're asleep there, and
  One song hide another song; a pounding upstairs
  Hide the beating of drums. One friend may hide another, you sit at the
       foot of a tree
  With one and when you get up to leave there is another
  Whom you'd have preferred to talk to all along. One teacher,
  One doctor, one ecstasy, one illness, one woman, one man
  May hide another. Pause to let the first one pass.
  You think, Now it is safe to cross and you are hit by the next one. It 
       can be important
  To have waited at least a moment to see what was already there.