2011 - Last day

Angel,

Today is the last day of 2011. New Years eve. A day to reflect on the past year - our trials and our accomplishments -- and a day to think about the coming year - what we plan and hope for our future.

This past year has been mixed with tough times and some of the very best too... but through every day, I have been grateful for you. Like every day, I will have you with me - on my mind... I cannot set you down.. 


At midnight tonight it will be your lips that I place the first New Years kiss upon... It will be your hand that I hold as we look forward to a bright future... It will be your smile that I see as we celebrate this crazy ride called life.


It will be you - even if only in my dreams...


Covering you...
Always...


Me

Distance Accordion...

Angel,

I am on the subway now and I am writing to you. Every day I ride these trains and as I sit or stand in the cars, I think of you. You are never out of my thoughts completely. You are always with me - in every little thing I do - you are there and I wonder what you would say, what would you think, what would you do?

I am surrounded by strangers who know nothing of me. To them - I may or may not even exist. But I am comforted by the knowledge that you know me - I exist for you.

These trains carry me to you - and away from you to. These trains accordion the distance between us in a rhythm that has played for almost two decades. Ironic that the accordion is a musical instrument that is played when pressed close to the heart.

As the accordion squeezes and the songs in my heart are joyful. Knowing that I am moving closer to you is the sweetest tune and the melody is light - yet excited.

Later, at the end of the day, as the accordion expands, the songs are a little more somber. The sounds are  tender and sweet with almost a yearning - but not sad - changed in their tone but confident that come morning the distance between us will once again diminish.

Our accordion plays and the music sounds and we dance this rhythmic dance. This we have done for a long time, but it is only recently that I have really paid attention to it. Now, to me, it is part of the most important piece ever written. It is part of the rhythm and music that is our song - our dance - us.

Thank you for sharing it with me. It would not exist without you.

beside you...
always...

me.

A dream...

Angel,

I hope that you slept well. I hope that for a time your troubles were set aside and that your dreams were filled with the wonders that can only happen in our dreams.

While in peaceful slumber you rode the winds on the backs of eagles and were carried to where ever you wanted to go. In dreams you can walk across the burning savannah, leading a procession of animals - where the zebra walks beside the hyena and the lion strides beside the gazelle. The giraffes with there graceful necks glide above the smaller animals. And the elephant lumber slow like living boulders and raise their trunks to trumpet your victories . The eagle you ride dips and swoops and turns, circling over the animals as you lead them across the plains and deliver them to a mighty river. Here they drink and rest in the shade and lay down together in sleep. And in their sleep they will collectively dream of you. They will dream of your wonders.

Such is the type of dream that I wish for you - this and many others.

My dream is to be beside you as you sleep. To hold you and to watch you and to listen to your breathing. With such a wonder in my arms, I would need no other dreams - no wonder in dreams could compare. When you wake, I will listen to all of the adventures you had through the night. You tell me all that you did and all that you will do - and you smile that most radiant and beautiful smile that shines from your whole face.

beside you...
me.

Weary..

To The Lady on the Train,

When I am tired and weary, all I can think about is climbing into our bed with you... resting with the length of you pressed to me, my arm around your waist... the feel of your skin against mine and your hair on my cheek... my lips pressed to the back of your neck... the rhythm of your breathing...

I would be there now with you if I could..

The Man in the Station

Boxing Day...

Angel,

Christmas Day is over and it is now boxing day... We were both distracted by our various commitments and activities... but in millions of moments through the day, you slipped in... I pictured you surrounded by your family, laughing and loud - Christmas morning excitement filling the house. I imagined you with me, sitting by my side, watching and playing with the little ones.. I imagined our shared laughter...

In many ways, I spent my Christmas with you...

Just Me.

Merry Christmas

To The Lady on the Train,

May this be your happiest Christmas. Though I will not be with you on this day, my thoughts will be with you. I will have you with me.

The Man in the Station

Sleep...

To The Lady on the Train,

I think that if you were here, I could sleep...
The warmth of your skin, the rhythm of your breathing, the scent of your hair...

The Man in the Station

Your Magic

To The Lady on the Train,

Magic swirls around you...

The way you  turn a kiss into pearl to be strung on a strand of memories...
The way you turn the night into diamonds on a velvet blanket...
The way you can touch me with your voice...
The way you have curled around my heart...

The Man in the Station

Snow Globe

This has been the warmest fall in memory - record breaking double digit temperatures in December. Jackets and umbrellas instead of parkas and hats... It is almost Christmas and grass is still green, the sun still warms us as we walk.

It isn't until the sun goes down, slipped under the western horizon, that the temperatures also slip under the freezing mark.

When you slide into the seat beside me, I can smell the cold that hugs you and has followed you into the car. You will soon be warmed by the car and my hand will warm yours, your fingers curled in my palm...

Later we walk under a velvet black sky, the cold night on our cheeks and noses... Our voices and breath made visible under the streetlights and by Christmas lights.

Only twice now this season do I remember snowflakes... And each time I have been walking with you... You close beside me - big blanket of sky, rows of lights and decorated houses... It seems that Christmas can't be white without you.

And as if on cue, large white flakes floating down... Completing the picture... Suddenly we are released into the wonder of a snow globe come to life... My world has been turned upside down and shaken - and is made beautiful and magical.

I could stand in this time and place with you for a lifetime.  Stand here with you beside me, feeling the snowflakes on my cheeks and lashes, watching them caught in your hair... Seeing Christmas lights reflected in your eyes... Knowing it is you who somehow brings magic to the night and makes the night and the season feel like Christmas.

I could stand here until all of the snowflakes have settled, the cold and magic settled on our shoulders and hair - and see that light in your smiling eyes.

And one kiss...

Thinking about you...

To The Lady on the Train,

Sometimes I think about you and I swear,

I must have the happiest, goofiest grin on my face.

Thinking about you makes me smile.

The Man in the Station

One Night..

To The Lady on the Train,

Tonight is our one night... I will watch you walk into the room like a dream and in that moment everything will stop... There will be no sound but the pounding of my heart... My breath will catch... All I will see is you...

Your hair up, dark eyes flashing bright, a sweet smile playing on your lips - nervous at your entrance... There will be a light lining your long neck and white freckled shoulders... Your beauty shines through the room and holds me...You are an angel that has somehow landed here..

That moment will hang there for a brief eternity...

At the end of the evening of dancing and laughter I will hold you - an angel in my arms until the morning light... And I will wonder at how it has happened to me that I should be so lucky - what deserving deed could I possibly have done..

For our one night I will hold you in arms of love .

The Man in the Station

Just a Kiss...

To The Lady on the Train,

Just a kiss... between us there is no such thing. I have always been able to hold myself close, revealing little of what I am feeling or thinking.. except when it comes to you... Just a kiss... one kiss... and I am sent reeling.. all of my senses spinning... It takes everything I have to keep any kind of restraint or control...

With the slightest touch of your hand in mine, the feel of you close to me, your hair next to my cheek... your lips pressed to mine, the taste of your tongue... I am suddenly a lost in a place that has no sounds but ours, no one else but us, and no time.  The floor falls away, the sky opens, and I am floating with just you in my arms... the scent of you filling me up, a soft moan in my ear. In this one brief moment nothing else matters..

Just a kiss... and contained within it is a whole universe.

The Man in the Station

The Sea

To The Lady on the Train,

You change like the sea - in your appearance, in your moods, in your distance, in your eyes... At times calm and still, at times turbulent, at times steady... but always changing - and always beautiful...

When you move - a tilt of your head, pulling your hair back off of your shoulders, turning in your chair, bending to write - the world stops, my breath catches, heart races... my senses reel...

I am still trying to get my sea legs.

The Man in the Station

Winter Comes

To The Lady on the Train,

The weather has turned colder.. The days are short and the nights are long...

The sun slants long shadows, the rare time we see the sun...

I would hibernate the winter away with you... curled up in a warm den, and watch you sleep in my arms...

The Man in the Station

Lucky

To The Lady on the Train,

I know that I am lucky to have you in my life.

The Man in the Station

Only one...

To The Lady on the Train,

You know that there is only one true Lady on the Train. You know, because you carry my heart.

The Man in the Station

In your eyes...

To The Lady on the Train,

In your eyes I have seen laughter..
In your eyes I have seen anger..
In your eyes I have seen joy..
In your eyes I have seen doubt..
In your eyes I have seen wonder..
In your eyes I have seen sadness..
In your eyes I have seen beauty..
In your eyes, I see you...

The Man in the Station

I would..

To The Lady on the Train,

I would walk to the edge of the ocean
just to fill your jar with sand...

The Man in the Station

Time... and you...

There are moments in our present when we get a brief glimpse of our past or a possible future. If we are lucky and if we are paying close enough attention, if we recognise the moment, we can see the past, the present, and a future all come together... Though we measure time if if it were a straight line, it does not travel that way. Time is magic and it shifts, speeds, slows.... It swirls through our lives, it does not always push us from moment to moment. 

We can see all of the moments that lead right up to this one special moment... we can see where the next moments can lead... And at that precise moment, we can feel the swirl of time like a soft wind bringing everything together... granting this brief gift of seeing what was, what is, and what may yet come...

Yesterday, I was lucky to see one of those moments...

I was lucky enough to see you in a moment when you were at your best but did not feel that you were... when you were radiant with beauty though you did not feel that you were... when your smile shone out even though you were holding yourself in... when you floated above a crowded room though you felt like you were drowning in it...

I was lucky enough to see you in a moment that for me almost stood still... and in that moment I could see you in the past in front of similar rooms... I know you will be there again...

But it was more than that... it was seeing all the contradictions in that moment and how they came to be.. and knowing that you are a universe of contradictions... that in you there is magic and time will never push you in a straight line...
 

Indian Summer

This first morning after the change of time back to standard from daylight saving finds me waking confused.. The morning light and the time on my clock do not match. The clock tells me that it is too early to be up yet; the sun tells me that it is time to move. I am persuaded by my stomach, a need for coffee... and the press of my bladder.. With a vote of 3 against 1, I start my day.


Early November and the weather is still sunny and warm. Many of the trees are holding onto green leaves though some have changed and dropped. The great 'V' formations of honking geese have not yet crossed the sky in any significant numbers. Grass is still green and growing. Indian Summer.

Autumn lingers.


Warm weather, sunshine, plants, squirrels - and people, all seem to be holding onto this season - for just a little longer... like a breath held, we know it will be released - and with greater force.. 

Waiting to exhale, I think of days walking on a tree lined cottage road.. ankle deep in rustling leaves - bare branches raking a grey blue sky, cold and clear... I think of our breath briefly hanging visible in the air.. I think of holding onto your gloved hand and feeling the transfer of heat between us.. I think of a fire, coffee, and curled up under a blanket as the dark presses against the windows... the first flakes of snow falling, catching them on our tongues and seeing them caught in you hair and lashes... I think of the pink of your cheeks from the cold, and warming them with my hands... I think of waking and rising to the day to start breakfast - talking to you from across the room - or listening to your breathing...

Each new season brings it's beauty. The end of each season is the promise of the next one...

The Whole World

To The Lady on the Train,

I cannot give you the whole world...

But I would give you my whole world...

The Man in the Station

Not Biased...

To The Lady on the Train,

You are absolutely beautiful.

The Man in the Station

Gravity and Orbit

To The Lady on the Train,

There is a gravity between us... No matter the distance, there is a tug that keeps us in orbit... Wherever you are are, I can feel you.

The Man in the Station

Ripples...

To The Lady on the Train,

Like a pebble dropped into water,  you ripple through my life far beyond where you first touched.

The Man in the Station

What I would have you wear...

To The Lady on the Train,

I would have you wear that red dress, your shoes dangling from your fingers as we walked hand in hand along white sand under a brilliant blue sky...

I would have you wear faded blue jeans, white t-shirt under one of my flannel checked shirts as we paddled the canoe across a glass still lake...

I would have you wear a tailored pant-suit, heals, fitted blouse as we walked through the path and strolled through stores...

I would have you wear white cotton underwear and an over-sized shirt as we curled up under a blanket on the couch to watch a movie...

I would have you wear a smile...

The Man in the Station

not a question...

To The Lady on the Train,

There are some questions that I promised you that I would never ask you again...

And some questions I will never ask you again...

But for the record... I would give you my whole world if you could take it... In a heartbeat.

The Man in the Station.

Friend

To The Lady on the Train,

Through anything, you can count on me. Always.

The Man in the Station

Happy Birthday to You!!

To The Lady on the Train,

Happy Birthday!!

On your day you will make a birthday wish. May all your wishes come true.

There is much that I wish for you but above all, I wish you happiness.

Covering you - now and always.

I love you.

The Man in the Station

never forget

To The Lady on the Train,

Don't ever think that I could ever forget about you...

I will never forget.

The Man in the Station

Early Fall Morning

It is dark in the mornings now. The dark and quiet of night lingers further into the measured day. It takes longer for the stirrings of the city to pull me from this bed. Slumber clings to my limbs and remains curled in my chest, holding me here, slowing my breath and movement. I am caught between wake and sleep; drifting between awareness and dreams... 

I want to float here, where my dreams of you feel so real that I can hold them in my hand, catch the drifting scent of your hair, and taste your skin on my tongue... 

I want to drift here longer, where I am sure that dreams are reality and the waking world is the dream... 

I want to drift here longer where the press of you against me in this bed must surely be true... 

I want to drift here until slumber falls from my shoulders and the dark is slowly chased away by the day... 

I turn, knowing now that I will not find you, rise... and greet the day..

Heaven

To The Lady on the Train,

Wherever you are is where heaven on earth can be found.

The Man in the Station

Shared...

To The Lady on the Train,

I would share in all of your triumphs and challenges...
I would be there by your side through every up and down...
In every way, I would be your biggest supporter...

Come what may..


The Man in the Station

Distance

To The Lady on the Train,

I do not like being so far away from you...
I want you near.

The Man in the Station.

Distance Changes

To The Lady on the Train,

Although I am now 400 Km away and in a different city - and will not be in the station for a few days... In many ways we are closer... Distance is never measured in feet, metres, yards, miles or kilometres alone...

I will fly back to you as soon as I can...

Promise...

The Man in the Station

For Keeps...

To The Lady on the Train,

Just so you know...
I'm playing for keeps... and I came to win.

The Man in the Station

Guarantee

To The Lady on the Train,

I cannot guarantee that things will always be good between us. I cannot guarantee that all of our hopes and dreams will come to be. I cannot guarantee that we will always have enough time for each other. But I do know that we won't stay still... we will change and grow... We will embark out on new adventures, try new things... We are starting a new path on this journey of ours... I am not sure where it will lead us, but I am more than happy to find out.

The Man in the Station

Angel

To The Lady on the Train, 

I could compare your beauty to the sunset, the moon, the stars... but that would not be fair to the Heavens from where you surely came. You are my Angel. 

The Man in the Station

Change, Hope and Love

To The Lady on the Train,

Nothing stays the same. There is always change. There are big changes coming for us - some I hope will lead to other big changes for us...

I hope for much - maybe too much. But my hope is filled with love, and a desire to let that love show itself....

The Man in the Station

Should

To The Lady on the Train,

I should tell you...

The Man in the Station

Our Journey

To The Lady on the Train,

As we continue on this journey; as we change and grow... there is one thing that I do know...
Come what may,
I love you always.

The Man in the Station

Fall

In this land we have all four seasons. Each one holds the air and the light differently, it is felt when it changes. The back of summer has been broken and fall has blown in. It pushed in yesterday, cloudy, on a goosebump wind and has now settled quiet on the city.

The cool temperatures are a melancholy relief from the scorch of summer. There is easy cool air to breath but gone is the press of sunshine on bare shoulders. The city will bustle with the beginning of the new season. We will hustle our children out of bed and off to the first day of school. We will rush ourselves to work and to our errands... We will be readying ourselves for the coming seasons - trying to make the most of what we have right now...

Reunion: Revisited

To The Lady on the Train,

I could not stop myself...

I fell and was lost in you all over again...

The Man in the Station.

Reunion

To The Lady on the Train,

It has been over a week since I have seen your face, your smile, your eyes... Today I will see you... I will get to be close to you - close enough to smell your perfume, to watch your hair move as your head tilts... I will see your fingers, the line of your shoulders...

I could let myself get completely wrapped up in you... I could fall right into your beauty, your voice, your gravity...

I could let myself fall and a large part of me wants to - oh I desperately want to... but I won't. I won't let myself fall. I am nervous about seeing you. I am never sure of the reception... I am never sure where you are... And so, I will keep myself close. I won't let myself become lost in you...

The Man in the Station

Distance

The distance between us is never constant. The physical distance between us has its rhythms... Our work, activities, schedules, trains... the patterns in our lives... I know when you will be physically closer or further away..
The emotional distance between us is more varied... there is no correlation to external events - no predictability... I have come to expect this – and every encounter, I test where you are – how close, how far...
There has been a shift lately... I no longer worry about the distance... I am not sure that I have hit the wall about caring about the distance... but part of me thinks that I have... I don’t want to say that I don’t care about the distance – but I can’t care about it, and so I have stopped...  I find myself not trying to judge the distance any more... and in a way, this creates a distance.
The distance between us is never constant.

Only you

To The Lady on the Train,

Under the height and weight of these downtown skyscrapers we walk along marble floors and pass through heavy glass doors - through hallways and courtyards.. past stores and food courts... the click of heals and the constant din of talking...It is a maze..

And it is where we spend much of our time... It is the waters we swim in - because we must...

This is where I see you - under these artificial lights and surrounded by these cold hard surfaces - the noise and motion surrounding us... But when I look at you, they all fade away - the world drops away, leaving only you and I standing there - walking through some hallway that I cannot pay attention to...

In the midst of the bustle I see only your smile, the tilt of your head and dark eyes shining back at me. The only motion is the sway and swing of your body as we walk, the changing curves of your back and hips with every step... the arch of your neck, curls framing the beauty of your face... the delicate V where your collar bones meet... your freckled shoulders and the soft skin along the back of your arms... the curve of your breasts and flair of your hips... the corners of your eyes and your smooth cheeks...

In the midst of the bustle I see only you.

The Man in the Station

Walk in the Rain...

To The Lady on the Train,

We walked together, side by side... close... Though the skies threatened rain, we walked... As a few drops started to come down, secretly, I was hoping for a downpour.. When the thunder rolled in the distance, I wanted to feel it shake my bones - I wanted to see the fork of lightening, hear the loud crack, feel the warm heavy rain.. I wanted to feel small compared to the storm, yet strong for facing it.. I wanted to be startled by it, frightened at it's potential - and to revel in it... and to know that I will last after it has passed...

Somewhere there was a storm - it was close - but this was not our storm.

We will wait. We will have our storm.

The Man in the Station

You were here...

To The Lady on the Train,

The shape of you rumples my bedsheets still. The pillow is still hollowed in the place where you lay your head... The signs of your presence may be fleeting, but the affects of your presence will last a lifetime.

The Man in the Station

Big Dipper

Here, I am in a land that is both strange and familiar. During the day I know where things are and how to get from one place to the next. I have charted out each landmark relative to the other landmarks. They do not have fixed positions in my mind. I do not have a larger context to place them nor myself in. North becomes whatever direction I happen to be facing.

Without the gravity of Lake Ontario's shoreline or a known slope of the land, I cannot fathom where north must be. Only the position of the sun tells me, but I ignore it because what it is telling me does not make sense.

Tonight I walked at night and looked up at the stars. I remeber you once saying something about being under the same sky - and I think of you. I can only see the brightest of stars. They should be familiar, but they seem so foreign. It isn't until I find the big dipper that I can orient the world and make sense of where I am standing.

I wondered if you might be looking at the same stars at the same time... For you, there would be so many more to look at... Like salt scattered on a slate floor. Would you see the band of the Milky Way stretched across the sky? Would you be lucky enough to catch a shooting star? Or follow the path of a satellite as it passed overhead?

I will not see them here in this strange land - but I have seen them - and can imagine you. I turn to my new found west - to where you are,  wondering all these things and more. I have tried to not miss you, but the stars have brought you to me.

Slipping away...

To The Lady on the Train,

I can feel the continued slipping away... The sands where I have anchored no longer hold... Even I am beginning to pull away from your shores, not rowing back...

I will miss you when you are finally out of sight.

You may miss me too.

The Man in the Station

Night Storm

The rains have finally come after what seems like weeks of unwavering heat and humidity. As expected, the rains have come in heavy downfalls with wind, lightening, and thunder. The storm is a relief and it is the thunder and lightening that wake me in the very early hours. My small bedroom is pitch black, punctuated by the blinding clarity of flashing forked lightening. The kitchen and garden beyond it's window are caught like a camera flash... 1 Mississippi, 2 Mississippi, 3 Mississippi... and then the rolling of the thunder... the house shakes and it rattles in my chest, rolling over my body and my head, then passes into the east - becoming more distant with every count... 4 Mississippi, 5 Mississippi...

I hear the rain pounding the pavement through the screen.. gutters overflowing, not being able to keep up with the sudden torrent... and the change in the air is palpable... I know that the morning will be cooler. I know that the plants and trees will seem greener... they have been waiting for this... This storm will signal the turn of a season, the first hint that this summer will not last forever... The plants will now rush to finish their growing, the production of fruit or seed - their reason for their first bold shoots up our of the ground in the spring... to get to this point where they can produce the next generation of their species before they hibernate or die.. this storm will be the signal of the home stretch..

I turn in my cool sheets, feeling a breeze on my bare skin where I am not fully covered.. I turn to face the window where I can better watch the storm.. When the lightening fills the room, I can see my arm, a toe..  I imagine what it would be like to watch this storm with you... if you were curled up with me in this small metal framed bed... to feel the contrast of your warm skin and the cool sheets... would you shiver next to me with bare shoulders? would I see and feel your hardened nipples under the white cotton sheet? I imagine the press of your long leg against mine and your buttocks nestled to the flat of my stomach, and our arms entwined in front of you... I know the scent of your hair and the feel of it on my cheek. Would it change in the storm?

I can imagine rising naked and chilled, taking you by the hand, pulling you to follow me. Could I lead you out to the garden to feel the warm rain fall on our naked bodies? have our hair matted to our heads? our faces lifted to the black sky, mouths opened, holding on to one another... to be startled and exposed to the world naked and wet for an instant in a flash of lightening - then become invisible again as the thunder rolls through us and we laugh..

Seeing each other only by touch and wild bursts of light.. we stand naked in the garden under this storm.. I would kiss you in the dark - pull you to me to feel your slick skin against mine... and together, here, in the garden in the rain - we would feel the first turning of the season...

Capture your Dreams

To The Lady on the Train,

If I could somehow capture the magic of your dreams as you slept and soak them into a canvas... paint them in colours rarely seen... or turn them to poems, a novel... words and images that brought them back to move you in the day as you were moved in the night... If I could somehow give you your hearts deepest and hidden desires.. present to you your whims, thoughts and fantasies... to hear the echo of your voice and to have it ring forever... I would gather you up and present you to the world.. I would have you see you..

The Man in the Station

Stuck in Limbo..

To The Lady on the Train,

I do not know why you have gone. I cannot understand it... I cannot think of anything that I may have done to deserve this cold shoulder treatment..

If I have done something, I wish that you would tell me. If I haven't done anything, then this is completely unfair.

I want to be angry. I want to yell. I want to tell you that I deserve to be treated better - to have an explanation...

I am just left wondering... and it feels like you have completely lost interest in me... If you have lost interest, or if you are interested in another, I wish you would just say...

It is like those times when you are on the train and it just stops in the middle of nowhere - for no apparent reason... Everything was going along fine, and then..... stopped... No announcement... no way of knowing what is going on... no acknowledgement that your desire to keep moving is being taken into consideration...  You wonder if there is another train, someone hurt, mechanical failure... and until you either start moving or someone lets you know what is going on, you are left to wait and wonder... Stuck in limbo...

I hate limbo..

The Man in the Station

Have I told you?

To The Lady on the Train,

Have I told you lately how beautiful you are?
Have I mentioned the way light bends to your beauty, or the way everything else disappears when you smile?
Have I compared your eyes to distant shining stars?
Have I told you how everything about you fills me up?
Have I told you that I miss the feel of your cheek next to mine and the feel of you close?
Have I told you that I miss the sound of your voice in my ear and the sound of your breath?
Have I told you lately that I am in awe of your strength?
Have I told you that I am amazed by your tenderness?
Have I told you lately that I love seeing your face in the sun?
Have I told you lately that you are an amazing woman?
Have I mentioned that any man deserving enough to have your attention should want for nothing else?
Have I told you that such a man should consider himself blessed?
Have I told you lately that you are magic?
Have I told you that the feel of your hand in mine presses on all of me?
Have I told you lately that I love you?

I should have told you...

The Man in the Station

Time...

To The Lady on the Train,

I do not know where you go... I do not know why you go...

To unlock that would be to unlock the mystery of you. Just give me time...

The Man in the Station

To know you...

To The Lady on the Train,

With all of your subtleties you have changed worlds... Sunlight bends to your beauty... Your grace has lifted entire lives... Your shy look and quiet smile can move a man beyond his known capacity... Your motion can make a man unable to move... Such a combination of strength, beauty, tenderness, resolve, knowledge, innocence..

Simply, to know you is to love you... and a desire to only know more...

The Man in the Station

Black Night

There is nothing quite so unsettling as dead silence in the middle of the night... and the dark so black you don't know if your eyes are opened or closed. Everything is still...

The grinding wheels of a turning streetcar pulled me awake, but it has gone now - headed on its run through deserted city streets...

The only sound is my breath.. the house is not even creaking tonight... no hum of the fridge or furnace... just black silence.

In my dreams and in the turnings of my sleep, I have reached out for you, hoping to find the warmth of you close. On a night like this, I would run my fingers along the length of your sleeping naked form, tracing your lines and curves... Lay gently beside you, curled to your back... slowly draw you to that place between sleep and awake with warm slow kisses on the back of your neck... As you slowly turn in the land between dreams and aware, I would explore the shape of you... your hills and valleys... softness and strength... I would breath in the scent of you, finding you in the dark by instinct... blind, but knowing your body by a touch as gentle as a breeze...

As your body responds to mine... Your breath changing... In the silence, in the dark... I would make slow gentle love to you... Clinging to each other and slow rocking... Some where between sleep and awake... But always in my dreams...

Changeling

To The Lady on the Train,

You are so changeable, never the same... Solid, a willow, smoke, rain, an oak, an ocean, a breeze, lightening, stillness, a flurry, a wall, a caress...

In all the shades and forms of you, always beauty... always my heart.

The Man in the Station

A Future

To The Lady on the Train,

You are the most amazing woman. A beauty and strength that astonishes me... a sweetness and tenderness that absolutely moves me...

There are times when I get a glimpse into what might have been... the past that I might have had, the future that I might of had... It is though all of my choices are laid out before me like a great plain, the paths that I could have chosen... all the things that I did not know, did not trust, or never thought possible...

But I am grateful for what I do have - and I cannot regret any of the choices that have brought me to you...

I would spend my life with you, if I could... I would give you all that I have and all that I am... and I would be the better man for it...

The Man in the Station

Absence..

To The Lady on the Train,

Does absence make the heart grow fonder? Or does it allow one to fade away a little bit every day?

It seems like both...

The Man in the Station

Moments

To The Lady on the Train,

There are moments that pass between us, so ephemeral, yet so intense that they will hold me for days....

These moments, strung out on the rope of time, like pearls on a necklace - each one unique, each one precious...

These moment are magic... They are when I know all that I need to..

The Man in the Station

A Wish

To The Lady on the Train,

I wish for too much...

The Man in the Station

So short...

To The Lady on the Train,

You didn't stay here for long and are gone again...

It seems shorter every time.

The Man in the Station

Saint Helen's Steeple

The steeple from the church rises up over this neighbourhood, pointing, like a finger to the sky. It is a sentry over the rooftops of the crowded houses, the narrow streets, the back allies... And though I cannot see it from this place in the back yard, I know that it is there.. I could point in it's direction through brick and trees.. it has a dominant presence over this landscape.. it presses itself upon the consciousness of this neighbourhood...

This area is busy.. there is always something moving.. cars, streetcars, working families and the downtrodden.. all huddled into the lee of the railway tracks on the slant toward downtown..here, it is gritty and sublime... slimy dangerous bars with underworld and desperate people jostle against neo-hippy granola crunchers in the organic shops.. but all us move under the shadow and watch of the church steeple...

Today, the normal din of the streets - the cars and rails, shouts of children or men fighting.. all of that changes when the bells start to ring... The clear metal sound floats over the roofs, loud and distinct.. pulling your thoughts toward the steeple, whatever else you may have been doing stops.. like being pulled awake from a dream, your focus changes..

I do not know what the bells are ringing out.. a death, a marriage, a birth... a gathering... There will be people gathered on the front steps of the church.. grey men in jackets and hats.. short, plump women, dresses too tight.. the youth on the edges of the lawn, awkward and wanting to play,  teenagers caught between the two, not sure how to act, torn between proper respect and abandon.... A coffin or white dress... the gatherings are the same - it is only the emotion that changes... and maybe the shoes..

The bells ring out some occasion in this neighbourhood...a profound change in the lives of some members of this community.... and for a brief moment, we are made aware - to take note.. to perhaps pay attention to people that we do not know... The bells ring out some common human experience - love, loss... The bells ring out their joy or sorrow... and so it is shared...

The steeple rises above this neighbourhood, a sentry. A reminder that we are all in this together.

Spaceman

To The Lady on the Train,

Your wonders and contradictions never cease to amaze me... you are a universe... I will gladly fall into your orbit and explore... always learning, always surprised...

The Man in the Station

Wherever

To The Lady on the Train,

I do not know our future... I do not know where we will end up or the paths that we will take...

But wherever I go, I want you to be there...Wherever you go, I will be by your side...

Come what may...

The Man in the Station

Sometimes..

To The Lady on the Train,

Sometimes I feel that  am not enough to hold you, to keep you...

The Man in the Station

freckles and stars...

a sliver of a white moon is hung low in a pale bright blue sky... early evening still and the sun's influences lights our world as the moon strengthens..

but the earth will turn on it's axis and soon the moon will disappear into the western horizon, following the sun..

without a cloud in the sky, I already know that this night will reveal a million stars.. the sky black velvet pinholed by pure white stars, each one a hope... a dream... an entire universe to explore, a glimpse of wonders that we might imagine.. colours that we cannot see, distances that we cannot fathom...

and here on earth, ... a million freckles on your white skin... each one it's own miracle.

every star in the heavens is magic... each one a wish, a kiss, a hope, a dream, a mystery... The stars will arc across the sky through the night.. The morning will dawn like this evening, a pale blue sky, the moon following the sun...

but mirrored in the day, across your arms, shoulders, breast - your freckles like constellations... truly heaven on earth.... beauty revealed

on your flesh, wonders yet hidden... a universe across the sky of my thought.

if only... then you would know...

On this bright blue morning - a day after the storms; the cool air like a crystal, and the sounds of the still sleeping city, my thoughts are wrapped up in you. If I could only send my thoughts out to you to wrap around your warm body still laying in your bed... hold you tight for just a bit and watch you sleep... feel the rise and fall of your breath and the beat of your heart... If I could send out my thoughts to you as a projection of myself that blankets you and lays sweet kisses on your temples and cheeks, nestles warm on your shoulder, a whisper on the back of your neck...

Then you would know...

You would know everything that I lack the words to express...

To The Lady on the Train,

Time is linear. We can never go back to change our past, correct a mistake, take advantage of some missed opportunity... Fix what you can, Forget regrets...

No day but today...

The Man in the Station

Come, My Love

Come, My Love

The night trains are rolling

over the crossings and under the bridges

low rumbling engines, felt more than heard

and the lonely whistle calls

steel and wheels 500 miles away by morning

but this dark night I want you near

the curl of your back to my heart

Come, My Love

The night trains are rolling

The Man in the Station

Ache...

To The Lady on the Train,

My heart aches for you... I would carry any load for you, if only I could...

The Man in the Station

Haunt...

To The Lady on the Train,

Wherever you may be, whatever you may be doing, wherever I may be, whatever I may be doing, my thoughts are with you. I cannot set you down. There is something of you in every action, every sight, every sound...

We move through space and time and our ghosts follow us like a wake...

The Man in the Station

A Dance

To The Lady on the Train,

Holding your hand in mine, the press of my palm into the small of your back, the scent of your skin filling me up... the feel of the length of you against me, the softness of your cheek next to mine...

As we danced, turning slow on the hardwood floor... everyone and everything else fell away... and time changed... it was an instant and an eternity...  never wanting to let go, for it to end... to release us back into the world...

You change time and space.

You are magic.

The Man in the Station

Secret Smile

To The Lady on the Train,

I sometimes see you when I least expect it and my breath catches, my heart races, and everything stops for a moment... What surprises me though, is that I have the same reaction when you first come into view when I do expect to see you... And invariably, I smile... because it comes from deep within and here it manifests itself... my happiness at seeing you will not be held contained...

Being with you is like standing in the warm sun after a long winter... everything is warmed, brightened... lifted up...

The Man in the Station

Away and a River

To The Lady on the Train,

Sometimes there is a far-away look in your eyes, your jaw set tight and square, and your mouth held tense... You are away somewhere... thinking... In these times, your voice changes tone - the language you use is much different too...

I see you as someone who realizes that they have just put one foot on what may be quicksand... or someone who has just come through some fire and must now reflect... some tough decision to be made, a regret to push through, a hard thing that must be done, a person who may be hurt, a leaving, an arrival... whatever it is, you hold it close.

During, these times I am in awe of you... the calm and business exterior, dealing with the daily routines and trivialities of life... but inside, inside there is so much more going on...Like a river where a strong current flows under a calm surface.. beautiful and gentle to see - but a power far stronger than most can imagine...you will carry through with a majesty and force that most fail to notice... to leave the safety of the shore to wade into your waters is worth knowing you... to know your currents, your strength, surprise bends and falls... to know that there are more wonders yet to be revealed... I would swim in your currents and eddies... I would learn where you would go... and see all the more beauty in you because of it...

The Man in the Station

Building...

To The Lady on the Train,

I know where we have been. I know where we are. I know the limits.

But I know that within all that, there is a limitless bright future for us... I want to build with you... in all the ways that we can.

The Man in the Station

Beside you...

To The Lady on the Train,

Though we may ride on separate rails and there is time and distance between us, I am beside you.

Always...

The Man in the Station

Grey Evening...

Angel,

As promised by the day, the rains have come. The city air is pregnant with the smell of wet pavement and the splashing sounds of tires in the rough rutted roads. Small rivers run down either sides of the streets - the asphalt shedding the water like the back of a giant black snake. 
These rivers withe their small eddies and puddles run their end into a corner grate. Falling into an underworld labrynth of sewers that we never see... Never consider how vast a network it must be...

Some of the rain will be sponged up by lawns and gardens - the plans already greening with their gratitude for the rain. But most of this water falling on the rooftops and roads will be funnelled under ground.. These little rivers joining all of the other little rivers... All flowing out to the lake that this city is built on the shores of...

The two natural rivers that run through this city; the Don in the east and the Humber in the west, will swell with the rain. And they will end at the lake as well - pushing out their charge into the deep grey vastness of Lake Ontario.

The city feels new, clean, fresh... We have been redeemed.. The dirty sins of our city washed in water and our filth absorbed by the lake, our Baptist, the mother of this city.

We are changed by the rain though we do not know why.

Grey Day...

Angel,

Today threatens rain - not the violent thunderstorm with black clouds, lightening and thunder that rattle through your body. Today does not promise anything that would be so obvious.

Everything is grey - the sun cannot be located in the sky, yet there is light. Tall buildings disappear into a white mist - the low clouds that have settled over the city.

The sounds of the city are loud and muted - carried on a sticky humid breeze. If it were warmer this humidity would be stifling - but in the cool it feels like a caress. In the air are contradictions of light and dark, loud and quiet...

Today is a day that if you want to feel it you have to pay close attention to. It is a whisper. It is a lullaby. Listen to the day... A change is coming.. Soon...

The breeze that you barely feel and do not notice can change your entire world.

It can bring the sound of your footsteps to me. It can carry the scents of you...

Today threatens rain but promises so much more...

Whatever this day will bring... Come what may... I will be thinking of you.

Just Me

The 506

Outside my west facing window, the early morning sky is just starting to fade from black into velvet blue. I can hear the squeal and grind of the metal streetcar wheels as they turn off Dundas onto College. Theses streetcars run all night long shuffling the shift workers, the shiftless, and the party goers. The whining floats out over the rooftops in the still morning air and settles in the tight streets and alleyways. Instead of being annoyed by the sound, by the intrusion of it on my consciousness, I am comforted by it...

This streetcar line that runs between Main Street station in the east and Dundas West station in the west is a line drawn between our old neighbourhoods, our pasts, our childhoods, and the places where we grew up.

The squeal reminds me that there may be time and distance between our lives - a city can be wedged between us, worlds apart - but that there is some undeniable line that runs between our worlds... Though there was no way to know what it was or that it even existed, there it was... Every day that line runs... The way to you and your world... And at any time I might have boarded, ridden the distance, walked your streets... You might have found your way to mine... But it was not the right time yet...

I listen the the turning streetcars turning in the early morning. They tell me that there has always been a way to you, though I did not know it then. And I know that there is always a way to you now. And if ever I lose sight of you, I have only to ride whatever streetcar is sent.

Waking up...

To The Lady on the Train,

I woke with the scent of you still on my skin and the image of you still in my dreams... As I drifted toward awareness I fought the inevitable wakening... I wanted to cling to sleep, cling to the dreams of you where we swam through endless nights of making love, touching, talking... looking into your eyes, brush of cheek, tumble of hair, sigh...I wanted to feel the warmth and press of you on my skin, on my heart, on my soul...You have imprinted yourself on me, like no other... I feel like I should be afraid, that I am exposing something very vulnerable... but I will not hold back from you - I will bear all to you...

I had you with me in my dreams...I will have you with me through the day... Awake, I can still feel your press...

The Man in the Station

Silence in the dead of night...

Even in the silence that hangs in the deepest night there are sounds that shape a place. The bones of the earth, of this house, and of this bed groan and creak in their own unique and mysterious tongues. The furnace coming alive - motor, air, heat... the tick of expanding metal. The sound of the fridge turning off with a rattle.

I turn in my bed, my own bones making their unique sounds - the knees and elbows and shoulders creak or crack. The sheets whisper against my bare skin and remind me of the warmth they hold. My breath is an even rhythm... my heart beat more felt than heard...

I lay in my bed, listening to the silence of this place,  and cannot help but think of you... I imagine the silences that surround you. I wonder if your sheets whisper with the same voice against your skin. Is the sound of your own breath familiar and foreign to you? 

I can imagine the sounds of you... hear you turn in the dark, drawing a leg up to cradle... A sigh... The rhythm of your heartbeat..

I imagine the sounds of you in this place with me... I listen to the sounds of your silence. 

Ouch...

To The Lady on the Train,

Ouch...

The Man in the Station

Smile

To The Lady on the Train, 

 

I can't help but smile - every time I see you. 

 

The Man in the Station

Curious

To The Lady on the Train,

It is curious, the turns of fate and chance...
And I am happy for both...

The Man in the Station

no other...

To The Lady on the Train,

like no other...

The Man in the Station

Protecting...

To The Lady on the Train,

I don't want to have to protect my heart. I don't ever want to protect it from you...

The Man in the Station

Changes...

To The Lady on the Train,

I have no idea where we are going. All I do know is that whether everything is good between us, or we are having a rough patch that we will not abandon each other on this journey. Things will change. We will change. Our lives and circumstances will change. But we will always be close enough to find each other.

The Man in the Station

Come what may...

To The Lady on the Train,

Come what may, you will always have my by your side for as long as you will have me there.

And yes, you can hold me to that...

The Man in the Station...

Magic and Miracles

Magic swirls. It does not travel in a straight line. It ebbs and flows like tides or the wind. It can be gentle and fleeting, difficult to see its work, a whisper, a mist...  - or it can course through your life, changing everything in an instant leaving you bowled over and stunned, a tornado...

Magic swirls and flows through our lives, continually changing our landscapes, our direction, ourselves... It pulses through our veins, it wraps us up, and it releases us... Seemingly directionless, aimless - yet driven to some unknowable end...

This miraculous blue gem that has been placed into the heavens as our home is a constant swirl. The air and the waters are in constant motion - they play and interact - creating new and formidable forces... A dense rolling mist, clouds, snow, a wall of rain... The waters tides move in their rhythms, great herds of animals move across the face of the earth according to their own rhythms... Huge flocks of birds travel the skies seeking currents and drafts to carry them to their next destination.

We are here on this planet, our home by the grace of the magic and miracles that swirl, wind and weave this place together for us...

And in our small patch of this orb the day has dawned clear and cold and bright. Today we are caught in the sparkle of a diamond... Spring has come - or at least the very real promise of it. Geese fly low overhead in impossible formation, calling to us, calling out the sun, heralding the spring.. Though the frost lies on the ground, the air crisp in our lungs, our breath still hanging in the air - the sun warms our cheeks and something inside is lifted up... The magic of rebirth and renewal flows through our veins and in the sap of the trees and is carried in the songs of birds... We are all moved by its inevitable force...

Magic and miracles flow and swirl through our lives... Inexplicable, unknowable, mysterious... Yet real... It is days like today where I feel it so strong, and know that come what may, whatever magic may have in store for us... That we still have miracles before us...