I wrote this poem sitting on the subway. Eye contact or any sort of connection is a delicate thing on the subway, even maybe a taboo and I have always wanted to explore why it is so. We are literally so close and at the same time, perhaps because of it, so distant.

If looks could talk.

Hello, I know it’s rude to stare, but I just wanted to say something to you.

Sometimes I feel lonely and maybe you are kind enough for me to take a chance.

I don’t know much about you apart from your shoes, your shirt, your stop.

There’s only a few feet between us though.

That can’t be that hard to bridge, can it?

I mean, if I stood up and just fell out towards you…

Sorry. Maybe I’m creating too much pressure.

It’s just every time I remember to relax I’m by myself at home but wishing I was out with friends and when I get there I’m wishing I’m home with you.

It’s like those two brothers who lived different lives and both wanted what the other had.

Fickle and indecisive. I’m trying to see these things as a positive.

That’s why maybe here is an ok place.

Nothing is static on the subway, it stays changing.

I can relax when things stay changing.

My mind eases with the schizophrenic mnemonic.

Vacant seats are filled with evasive faces replaced in repetition by persons escaping the proclivities of the world above and outside this clustered reality, this frustrated medium.

You still haven’t said a word.

I can talk a lot, I know.

My stop is quickly coming.

Do you think that would be ok if we could be each other’s meantime friends?

I watch you get up.

You disappear quickly as you file between people on your way out. You stop in front of the doors and wait.

You smile. It reminds me of the world yet takes me from it.

I look up and open my mouth to say one last thing but the doors click and open, splitting your face from mine as you steal into the world beyond my pane.

It’s ok. I know what you wanted to say.

I will be here when you return, waiting in the windows.