Poem | On a Train Platform...

On a train platform, a man reads a jewish novel.
I smile at him, sip my overpriced coffee while attempting to look cosmopolitan
(or at least less nervous than I feel).
I think cynical thoughts about the couple stood next to me as they lovingly kiss while I watch the flame of lust burn away at its last oil.
Everything ends, this will end.
A lesson I have learnt,
and so I became an island after the sea creatures I once swam with grew into sharks as I bled.

On a train platform, I share a worried look with another,
For a second we become partners in an anxiety dance.
It is silent, but my mind hears a symphony of alarms and buzzers and voices of strangers as I plan for potential, fictional outcomes.
I hate to travel alone but oh how I love the loneliness as I soothe myself,
I calm myself, I control myself,

On a train platform, I think of him.
Silently happy to be returning to his proximity,but subtly wishing I was going a different way.
A different town, a different state of mind that I had before.
Not romanticising and idealistic,
but cynical in the name of realism,
and realistic in the name of fear.
Suppressing images of demons with the other faces and lambs crying and following.
Push it out, push it through the crowd.

On a train platform, a man reads a jewish novel.
He smiles about me, I step onto the train,
and forget about it.