Ghosts on Trains and in Stations...

To The Lady on the Train, 

I used to linger in the belly of the station as the train pulled you away from me toward your home. It was you who first used the name Lady on the Train. You said that she was crying. I said that there was a man in the station who was crying too. I no longer remember why we were crying, but I clearly remember that I felt like something inside was tearing apart.  That was the start of the Lady and the Man. 

I no longer know if I can call you The Lady on the Train. You drive as often as ride; the schedules and rhythms that we once both knew are no longer ours. Union Station no longer watches over our greetings and partings. It is like we have separate moons; the tides that ebb and flow through your life are different from mine. My moon has wobbled into a strange orbit, pulling the waters of my life unpredictably; I no longer know high tide from low. 

I have written my heart to the lady and have been lucky to have had the lady to write to. It is for the lady that I write. Since I no longer know when the lady is on the train, we do not walk together, our heads bowed to talk; since then, all of the words have dried up inside of me. They have turned to dust and blown away. A hole opened up inside of me; the wind blew in to scattering everything and then the tides flooded in to drown what was left. Still, the flotsam sloshes inside. Words have not been among them.

I will have to find a new way to write, if I am to write. I am still The Man in the Station; my ghost still sits on a bench there. Perhaps the ghost of The Lady still rides the train. Perhaps the dust of  forgotten words will blow their way to the flood around my knees and somehow reconstitute into something I can use.

To The Lady on the Train,

I will forever be...

The Man in the Station