by Aidan Chivers

As I wait for my train I watch thoughts and strangers roam

In two centuries of litter where I stop and bathe my mind;

I trace the seats, the tracks, the stars, to see, or maybe find

A moment for myself in this place they’ve all called home.

I step across the gap, weighed down with the heavy tome

Of age-old words and waste, which leaves me stuck behind:

As the train enters the night, to its man-made path confined,

Harsh lights brush through Bristol’s moonlit monochrome.

A man stands still on the platform, looking back at me,

With eyes that catch me in their grasp, his pupils inky-black.

I form a poem in his head as Brunel’s station starts to flee;

He shrinks away, a distant shape across the track.

I lose myself, I turn, and aching, strain to see –

I watch and blink, but just my own two eyes stare back.