GOING

	By David Kherdian


	Unloading boxcars
	on Erie Street
	for quick money

	taking anything
	that came along
	always on the run

	which was anywhere
	and going
	because I never

	stood still and
	sold siding, shoes,
	awnings, pots & pans

	you name it
	whatever came
	around the block

	I jumped and rode it
	until I got bucked
	or bored

	waiting for that one train
	the great chance
	to ride the rattling rails

	down that track U. S.
	on the boxcar that
	held my name

	or anyhow
	that?s what I thought
	I was waiting on

	until it came and I went


--
David Kherdian's poems are from his 20th book of poems, forthcoming
from Taderon Press, London, in early 2006. He has published 63 books
in a variety of fields, including a Bibliography of William Saroyan,
three memoirs, fiction, retellings and translations, a life of the
Buddha, children's books and several biographies including The Road
From Home, for which he was awarded numerous awards and prizes,
including a Newbery Honor Book, The Jane Adams Peace Award, The Boston
Globe/Horn Book Award, and a nomination for the National Book Award.
Also, for one of his novels, he was given The Friends of American
Writers Award. In addition, he has edited nine anthologies, founded
three small presses, and he has been the editor of three journals,
including Ararat, Forkroads: A Journal of Ethnic-American Literature,
and Stopinder: A Gurdjieff Journal for Our Time. David is currently
editing a paper called The Tree, while compiling The Armenian-American
Writer: The First Generation, which will consist of novelists, short
story writers, playwrights, and poets, ranging over the last 82 years,
that will also feature essays on these writers by as many
second-generation Armenian-American writers.