The train will be late and all seats taken,

we’ll hear an explanation of sorts:

snow or leaves upon the tracks,

a man with suicidal thoughts.   

 

But we’ll pay little heed to that

in stewing elbows, hips and laps,

the stench of sweat, tobacco breath,

and yesterday’s kebabs.  

 

I’ll think of Crime and Punishment  

amidst the swirl of coughs and sniffs;  

how perched upon a precipice

with one square yard in which to sit  

 

submerged in fog and desolate,

man still prefers life over death

were it to last a thousand years.

I’ll knit my brow and hold my breath;   

 

if there were space to swing a fist

I’d punch my face and shake the press

of humankind hatefully close

sustaining us in uprightness   

 

when both of us desire collapse.

My eyes will misadventure past

the dandruff fallen on a back

to semblances in blackened glass,

 

to ghouls assembled in a pack

that haunt the flanks of memory.  

I’ll stare them out of countenance

and close my eyes in reverie

 

as stations swallow passengers  

and apparitions evanesce

we’ll occupy a corner seat  

and close ranks in togetherness.

 

We’ll write our names on window stains,

messaging through murkiness;

we’ll make-believe we’re stranded on  

this train without a terminus.   

 

Hands and fingers interlock,

eyelids hanging heavier;

draw the venom, kiss me clean

and dream us through millennia.