"The next train will arrive shortly."
Amidst the crowd,
We place a final period on one another.
The moment I chance upon a kindred soul,
Unconsciously, I watch your footsteps.
Awakening for a brief instant,
Reflected in the train window,
Her visage—
Was merely the ancient groan of the train.
"Woooong"
a white feather turns
in the stillness of the empty station~
slow spiral,
soft drift,
a small brightness
mapping the quiet air
as if the room
were breathing it.
I met her in a dream at a washing station in Bangladesh
I might have tried to hold her hand by the thread she held
Which passed through the interior of a manicured shrub
Severely cut into the form of a dense sunless topiary ball
So tightly was it manicured to create a studied appearance
Of formal stability and calm that no air or sunlight reached its interior
And you could smell the rot from inside at a distance
And hear the screams of a six-year-old child from inside as well
Calling out desperately from the rot for attention and care
That I might follow the thread and see into the plant I dare not go
For there were broken off rotten limbs of its trunk lying by its side
From those who tried to reach the centre of the shrub before
So, I held back my desire to reach the centre and stopped out the noise.
I sat in the sunlight of what was once northern India and wondered at life’s destruction
Where none of Shiva’s many arms could penetrate into planned obstruction for aid
And the course of fate finds its way into unexpected dreams on night pillows rest.
In 1836, a posse of brave European settlers
Riding horses, armed with muskets
Brutally killed 12 Wiradjuri men, women and children
Can you remind me who the uncivilised ones were?
It all happened not far from my home
Where the kookaburras laugh high in the gum trees
Bodies piled up and burned like rubbish
Can you remind me who the uncivilised ones were?
It was rough justice they said
For the killing of two white settlers by Wiradjuri warriors
But dirty little secrets can’t be kept forever
Can you remind me who the uncivilised ones were?
Courage, bravery, wisdom and love
Maybe we can learn these things
From the traditional owners of the land.
Roads are all clogged ~ clogged with cars
there's too many too many by far
streets look more like a parking lot
there's no sword for this Gordian Knot
I'm leaving town want to get where I'm going
nothing's slowing me down
leaving town want to get there on time
I'm not dawdling or waiting around
like a hot cup of coffee on a stone-cold morning
or an ice-cold beer on a hot summer's day
it's a new lease on life down the line
leaving nothing behind I'm on my way
I'm taking the train to my next location
no car for me I won't be
driving to a new destination
traveling light making for the station
taking the train I'm taking the train
Quickly we had our breakfasts
Then we both gazed
At the station clock
The morning train is late
Everything is wet
At night, the rain poured heavy
I listened to it
Hitting the bricks on the roof.
So tasty is this coffee, you said
The smell of bread, the flame of the oven
And the two bags
You didn’t wear your trench coat, I asked
You didn’t reply
You doubted
Whether we could reach the airport before noon
The plane won’t wait for us, you said
What if the train never arrives
We have no time
The hands of the clock are not moving
And those waiting before us
Took their bags and disappeared
What are we waiting for?
I was lost in the cumulus clouds
Over the chimneys of country houses
Yet, the village was still sleeping
The station guard switched off the lights
And left, humming a song
Tell me
When will we leave too?
No one is here
Even you
You are not here
The rain has dried up
Your dreams became pale
And very far is the airport.
Staring at the sun,
Charging my engine,
My intention is letting it in,
I'm getting another insight,
The light is where I sit,
My candle is lit,
I fit perfectly in space,
Observing this place,
Embracing my energy,
Everything I see,
A reflection of eternity,
A projection from within me,
My entity run by electricity,
The sun connects to my gland,
Standing at attention,
This dimension is imagined,
Images from within,
Begin to render,
Surrendering to your beliefs,
The chief of a tribe,
Depending on vibrations,
Sensations arise to be felt,
You dealt this hand,
In command of the direction,
Correction is only progression,
Life is full of lessons,
Sit in a session with the sun,
Become one with its light,
If it hits just right,
It will ignite your gland,
Insights come on demand,
Because your staring at the gland,
The grand reflection,
Revealing a land,
That needs protection.
The projection you see,
Is the body of your energy,
Never being able to peer past,
Where your two eyes cast.
He was just a child
He would watch the trains
Every night at the same time
It was never more than ten minutes late
That was how he learned to tell time
They became his life
Then the day came when the trains stopped
It had been so many years
No one knew it was going to happen
But one day it was gone
Now he is an old man
That train stop is still making a few memories
But he does have one wish
When he dies, please let him die on that lonely bench
That way, it will be his first step to heaven
© Poem – XIV/I/MMXXVI
LRET
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The static hums like a hymn
between bursts of forgotten songs~
tinny trumpets, crackling crooners,
a needle skipping on a war.
Operator, oh Operator,
your fingers dance on dead frequencies,
sending Morse code to ghosts
who stopped replying in ’43.
Through the snowstorm of dead air,
a voice, thin as onion skin,
whispers the weather for tomorrow:
Clouds like ink.
The search
The Focus
The game
Strategy
Encounter
Ammunition ready
Enemy sight
Preparing attack
Torpedo hits target being the enemy
The enemy must submerge
Spotting the challenger on radar
The enemy has some damage, they won’t get far
The enemy attempts to fire their torpedo but misses the challenger
The challenger scores big
While the enemy trying to be hid
Radar discovers from the challenger being the enemy
Challenger fires their torpedo at the enemy
Ever so close
Suddenly the enemy’s submarine blew to bits
The challenger winning the score of 100
The enemy loses to Zero
Play station aim
Precision of the game
Victorious win.
I will not let my heart be kept
Under a stone at morn
Nor have my soul be swept
Under a carpet worn
For I have fought a winning fight
Against the living dead
So I will proudly lift my head
Into your glorious light
In times like these
When I’ve delayed all ease
That I could easily have had
I am not pained nor troubled nor sad
But content with the life I have
For written on the face of time
Is that in waiting in this world I find
All things will soon be mine
Tots waddle to the throttle of life...®a©e®s...start your engines!
Human nature takes wobbly steps forward >>>
Each clumsy effort supported to maintain balance$
Space and times collide *×*
Perpetual motion prevails...®a©e®s...engines revved!
Adulthood rapidly approaches!...Lord help us survive till they move out!
Chance encounters...on and off the computer °}©{°
Experimenting with forbidden fruits @ hormones.com/applejacks
Concerned parents patrol computer...once they figure out the password ?+?=?
Alcohol and weed are soon dating...huh?...what did you say?...uuh...huh?
Driving home with the ***** in their eyes!
Except...they're still in park!!!
Too much ghanja dulled their drive ° ° °
Space station number: 5
a lone ancient dark night
Your engine stumbles
rumbles, coughs to a stop
so close to E
The gas pump, blocky, digital
smells of gasoline
like a primordial dance
an intercourse of machines
rape of a Mesozoic age, processed
Petrol in a tank, deep
Swipe card, digital hum of circuitry
Choose your poison, your savor
Buttons—regular, premium,
Reek of diesel
Corruption
So many fingers have touched
that white square button
almost flesh-looking
White, pale, cracked, peeling
The horror of the mundane
You need to touch it
You want to
You have to
You have places to go
And miles before you sleep…
A former place this, a patch where roots rattle,
where stubble has a ferrous frizzle.
A long-truncated railroad stop
humming still with a faded reality.
As dry voices on the wind, they return
- the homesteaders and journeymen,
the harnessed horses.
Pants' cuffs carry kernels
long planted elsewhere.
Caps, coats, and carts
Sweat, rustle and creak,
an invisible locomotion of leaving and arrival.
employed upon an iron labor.
The tall dry weeds are talkative.
Brown boots seem to shuffle
as they wait here or idle.
A hollow clock clacks,
its innards now
are a nest for ticking birds.
Dandelions anticipate twirling flight
under a corn fed sun.
A mid-day heat thrums fragmented rails.
The station seems almost ready
to receive
as if its bygone world
had not forever disembarked.
Long ago, Mithila was left at this forsaken station,
As the train slipped away on the wrong track,
cutting all horizons.
There was no return
Mithila knew it, even then.
This waiting was only a silent, endless sigh.
In the dust-covered mirror of nostalgia,
Her past flickers, bright as gleaming,
Unreal in its stillness and beauty.
The present? A colourless traveller
That tells no stories, only passes by.
So much time has passed
As if a lifetime quietly devoured all she knew.
Mithila, lost in the unknown crowd, now nameless.
The rails no longer tune
The rhythm faded with the fog.
Time moved on, but never came back in harmony.
The train still whistles
But only for its own journey,
Not for Mithila.
There is no vacant seat for her now, no backwards glance.
Mithila is now just a name,
Drifting in the air of a grey and lonesome afternoon.
No one remembers her,
Only time leaves behind a fading trace.
And the future?
It is a nameless station of Waiting
Not new, just another destination of solitude.
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