(On a line by Sam Byfield)
The yellow moon, the factories, brief snow —
I’m only passing through aboard a train
streaking through your night. Once, long ago,
in another dingy city, in light rain,
I lingered at the station with some lover
or other, someone arriving or departing —
both of us young and destined to discover
absence. The old story’s always starting
or ending. And the chapters in between
slip by like nameless towns along the way.
The drifting moon and snow, a view I’ve seen
a hundred times. A woman dressed in gray
waits on the platform. I notice, as we pass,
my own face through the window’s misted glass.