Night Train

More scary than things that go bump in the night, My nerves are now shattered because of my fright. This left me like jelly and turned my hair white, I’m lucky I’m living, to tell of my plight. I was sitting and waiting, at a station one night, I’d been walking the moorlands, while I had the light. I often did this, for it gave me delight, To go ‘rambling’ for miles and view all in my sight. I thought that the trains didn’t run here no more, But I noticed a light as I walked off the moor. Imagine my joy, as I walked through the door, To be told trains were running, as they had before. After ‘clipping’ my ticket, he said I could wait, On the bench by the lamplight, just there by the gate. My train would arrive, at five minutes past eight, He never had known it, to ever be late. I sat there just thinking, the day had been fine, Leisurely reading the old station’s sign. Then billowing smoke, the train came right on time, But my God!… When I boarded, I fell on the line! I could not believe it. Now nothing was here! No engine, no tracks, I just shook with cold fear. I swear I’d been ‘rambling’, and not on the beer, But how in God’s name could it all disappear! I think that I passed out, or could I have died? I could not move my limbs, however I tried. I lay on the moorland, and stayed there and cried, This thing had me torn up, way deep down inside. I realised then, that this was the new day, I’d slept in a ditch and was covered in clay, I struggled back up from the place where I lay, And still feeling shaky, I went on my way. I can hardly remember the long journey home, But I used a taxi, I’d summoned by phone. I sat there in shock, it’s the last time I’ll roam, Or ‘ramble’ the moorlands, at night on my own. When first I got home, then I thought I had flipped, But soon realised, that I only had slipped. It was just a bad dream, that I’d had when I tripped, But on seeing my ticket… I found it’d been ‘clipped’! Ivor G Davies