More hours than feet; more trains than hours.
I could have stepped on every crack,
Walked in every direction; was it really
That empty, or has my memory merely
Refused to store people?

This time, I almost tried to understand
The place: build concrete and tarmac
Around the dystopian myth I have
Been sold for most of my life;
Construct a city from the cynicism.

It gave with one language and took
With another: suddenly everything made
Both more and less sense.
The difference between Flanders and Wallonia
Was more than mother tongue, it seemed.

*
In the ensuing years, I read and I read
And I read. Instead of paperback escapism,
My poison was electronic immersion:
A growing envy of those for whom
The special sights of that night were
Somehow everyday life.

The fire was fuelled by chance overheard
Conversations, but dampened by
The dawning reality of the decision I had made.

*
Ten winters have passed since I whiled away
Those lonely, echoing hours, but
It is only now that I am finally thawing.
No longer a prisoner of my own expectations,
Surely now I can spread my long furled wings?

But when I brave a glance under my skin,
I find that there is still frost, still
Layer upon layer of the ice that
Almost froze my desire to fly.

03/05/2018

Posted on 03/16/2018
Copyright © 2024 Richard Vince