Station sentience, a life sentence

 

Rushing thoughts collide in station sentience,

static fizzles crackle across the mist of a faded dream.

A memory lost in a kiss, a whisper left on the bus, arriving

in a new sentence.

 

And weaving between, broom in hand,

leaves of a story, a ghost amongst ghosts,

rambling the concrete and steel scenery.

Scraping chewing gum from station seats.

Wishes for greenery, to be free to amble in

the fields he wishes to see. To be a leaf on the breeze.

 

A sent text left on read, panic strewn youth

scratches his head, was it something I said?

A glance from a smile, a whispered word to a friend.

A look again, before face churns red and studies her feet.

The frequent traveller on the night bus to nowhere,

smiles at nobody. And nobody sees,

as they are too busy focusing on the floor.

 

So many formless poems unwritten, a silent thought

flows in, then whispers off again.

The smitten couple, the girl who wishes

to be home, her kitten in her paws, scared of

the bark of men in the howling town with their

fearsome claws sharpened in the dark of day.

 

The pregnant pause

 

Waits holding her belly as her bus arrives late.

In the hushed chaos of the crowed crush, her thoughts

peck in and out, a passenger to joy and fear,

her journey arrives soon, as she watches a previous

life disappear into the rush.

 

And on the benches the bleary eyed, sits cradling

can of amber, like a baby in his grip, and he surfs the

felling of tree across the concrete sea. A moment of his

own intensity, a moment just a moment of sobriety.

A thought of where he will one day be, a memory, before he

hugs the rest and throws it to the floor.

Litter life fleets in and out of his drowsy eyes.

The ghost sighs as the broom floats by.

 

The tears. The smiles. A heart that sits

forlorn, unpopulating the lines that form,

on the screen of his mind, picking

the sweetness, creating flowers from

thorns and thistle vines.

 

The bus sits awaiting, but the poet sits under fluorescent

awning, no rush, for words form only once the stars quit

falling in delicate sprinkles over his eyes.

 

And as the fading light of station nights sigh,

a song of the lost and alone, the wanderlust

and the found, lives collide in rushing thoughts that bound,

like waves and stone, and the lights blind his eyes.

As the view clears and ghosts vanish from sight,

every story, a part of his life.

Now left in the storybook of history that he writes,

as the broom of time brushes stardust from his feet.

Speaking in whispers

 

And we can talk all night

in silent words, our thoughts

painted on the walls

of our fear reddened cheeks,

we can let that

fear slowly sleep

as we let

our hearts

beat in conversation

instead.

 

And in whispers we can let out our secrets.

Those things that are kept only between us

and the moon above, a growing orchard of

fresh fruit, that all tastes of love.

I’ll listen intently.

and I’ll share myself, gently

in a sea of kissed butterflies.

For our words are more than a simple sentence.

We are a presence, and our language speaks in

the moments of silence,

and the longing

looks held in passion.

 

And we can talk all night,

our words patter

across the windows,

raindrops on glass, fragile

but sturdy enough to form puddles,

to forge rivers through

countrysides so vast,

to form oceans

we can just dive in and bask

in the hidden depths.

 

And we can whisper

in the ticking of clocks,

the way time stops, when eyes lock,

we can feel sensuous seconds elapse,

and twist the clock back

to a memory of the past,

or skip it forward to a future

where we see ourselves

watching over

new horizons.

As deep as we want to be.

In the silent whispers our seas

will never be shallow,

for our words are not hollow.

 

And when we let those words fly,

their wings soaring into the starlit night,

we can open our hearts more, pour out

our words to lay out a blanket fort

across the floor, and playfully

we can explore our minds,

we can sit in their silence

as they whisper stories,

put them together

into a piece of poetry

that future generations

will scour for truth, for clues.

For the words that whisper.

I love you.

Meat sack

 

Sometimes the world

can feel too big 

or just a little too small,

even your own street

can feel too much,

a vast canyon of distrust,

or a dead end with sheer brick wall

scrawled in graffiti slurs, 

eyes at every perching point.

Fingers ready to assume,

eyes to judge, lips to smear,

and towns can be chasms

of red rust and fear.

 

You watch the shadows intently,

Seeing them move in the flickering

memory of moonlight, a spectre

shaped from stories.

The way it warps at every

blink of the eye.

And inside you feel

your soul

slowly give up

the ghost

and

 

die.

 

And as you walk on.

A meat sack

controlled by a ghost,

you just watch as the days grow old.

Autumn falls on young soul,

leaves so much older

once the cold gets hold.

And the memories that once rained,

Now only come in trickles,

paranoid freckles of time.

 

And that which once tickled your heart,

now just scribbles on the walls,

an RIP,

to the love that you held inside.

 

And you sigh, under a street sign.

A destination underlined.

You believed you had

one of those once upon a time.

But now your map has been torn, the compasses,

only spin around, and the stars are blinking out.

 

But then a voice whispers.

in a delicate breeze. Something beautiful

a word of hope in a world deceased.

 

And your diseased

heart

once again

beats

in the distance.

 

And you rush to scrabble through the dirt,

ripping up old stories, worn hopes and faded shirts.

That no longer fit your bones. You dig, faster, faster,

nails shredded, blood stained and red.

fingers sink into something warm.

The beating heart

wanting to come home.