Merry Christmas

 To The Lady on the Train,

It is Christmas morning and the weather is unusually warm; there will be no white Christmas this year. Despite the weather and the darkness and fewer homes decorated with lights every year, it seems, we have somehow managed to keep our collective spirits up. It has been an active struggle and a test of will, and not always easy or successful, but we have made it to this day. And that in itself is worthy of celebration. 

A black wet morning of cold drizzle will slide into a flat grey morning of cold drizzle. And yes, though the Christmas lights shine on fewer homes, there are still bright coloured lights in the darkness. There are still signs of hope and happiness to cast away darkness and to guide us along city streets. 

Though the house is empty of children and the day will lack joyous squeals, though the magic of a Christmas snowfall has not appeared, there is still always gratefulness and joy to be found in what we already have. 

If all that you can see is all that you lack, the magic of this day is easy to miss, but it is still there. It may only be an ember,  but if sought for, tended, and given a breath of life, it will warm and glow. 

The magic of Christmas is not that it is given to us by weather or in receiving desired presents. The magic of Christmas is making our own little light amid the darkness, and to share that light with those we love. 

Merry Christmas. 

The Man in the Station 

A Gift

To The Lady on the Train,

There are those who would look at you and somehow not see the intricate curls of your hair or the line of your neck. 

There are those who would look at you and not see your sharp shoulders and elbows, or the angles of your arm as it rests on the table. And they would not see the delicate taper of your fingers that hold so much strength. 

Some who would look at you would not see the softness of your cheek and the dimpled spot below your eye, and somehow ignore the way your jaw sweeps up to behind your small ear. 

There are those who would look at you and not be moved by the swing of your arms and the pendulum of your hips and the bounce of your curly hair as you walk. 

There are those who would look at you and beyond reason, manage to not fall into your eyes.  

As impossible as it sounds, there are those that would look at you and not see all the magic and beauty that you possess. Those people who do not see you have missed a wonderful gift. 

The Man in the Station

Reflections on a drive

To The Lady on the Train,

Every time I have to get used to the sensation of missing you all over again. There is an emptiness that is the shape of you that I feel so acutely once we part. It is a place inside of me right next to my heart. 

When last we drove, half lost on streets we should know, we talked and debated, and I wanted to hold your hand.  It took forever to get not very far but I didn’t care and wanted to just drive and talk with you. 

I thought about taking your hand and wondered what you would have done. But I already know. You would have held my hand and your voice and eyes would have changed. I can picture the tilt of your face and the purse of your lips and see your conflict and thoughts and emotions tumble out in a glance.

You would have let me hold your hand and I suspect that part of you maybe wanted me to take your hand and part of you relieved that I never tried. Maybe in taking a little I would be taking too much. That is my greatest fear: taking too much. 

So for now I will take your time when we can. And I will hold in my mind all the images of you that I can grasp. And these I will keep. I have named your brown eyes Always and Forever.

The Man in the Station

In the rooms where you are...

To The Lady on the Train,

I do not know the rooms in which you now move. 

I do not know the walls, the stairs, the floors, nor the slant of your roof. I cannot imagine where you are. 

I cannot picture you at any table or resting on any couch. I cannot place you in a beam of slanted light coming in from your window. The where you are now is not the place where I see you when I think of you. 

The rooms where I know you are in the past. 

I see you in a carpeted basement, sleepy and content and beautiful.

I see you in a house of wood and stained glass and wonder, your eyes shining.

I see you in dim room upon a wooden bed, your fingers curled around the slats and a sigh escaping. 

I see you in an office lined with the tokens and trinkets of your life and I wonder if you still do that.

And I can still see you walking down a green carpeted hallway, black slacks, white blouse, and the twirling of keys on a lanyard and you not noticing me noticing you.

Though I do not now know your rooms, I do know your eyes. And I know the wildness of your hair and the smoothness of your cheeks. I do know the strength and straightness of your back, and I know the round and sway of your walk. I know your voice at my ear and the way it makes my heart pound.

I do not know the rooms in which you now move but for all the rooms that you take up in me.

The Man in the Station

15

To The Lady on the Train,

15 years ago, you would have been waking up to spend the day getting ready for an evening at a Christmas party. I imagine that it was a day of anxious stress.

Your shoes and dress already decided, purchased, and worried over. You would be getting nervous about how your hair would turn out. Would the makeup be okay? 

I can tell you that the dress was perfect. The shoes were perfect. The hair and makeup were perfect.

You were perfect. 

What you did not know then and could not know then was that I was smitten and intimidated by you and had been for some time. You wouldn't have believed it even if I had told you. You didn't believe it when I did eventually tell you.

That night I watched you from afar. I watched the grace and lines of your limbs. I watched the sweep of your hair and the arch of your neck. I watched you stand tall and straight and say the words that you needed to say. 

Though I remember parts of the night and some I can never seem to recall, there is a moment that will be with me always. Words tumbled out of your mouth that absolutely stunned me, and I still find myself being surprised by. Those words were to change so much in my life because they changed so much of what I thought that I knew. 

That night started something that I could never have expected or even believed. 

15 years ago, a casual comment changed my entire life. And I am beyond grateful.

The Man in the Station

Each time we part

 Each time we part I have to get used to the sensation of missing you all over again.

An Unexplored Country

 To The Lady on the Train,

There are some distant vistas, perhaps because of their distance or maybe because you can only catch glimpses of, that hint of paths and destinations and places to explore that make them so attractive. It is the unexplored country of imagined valleys and sunlit mists on the edge of sight that holds so much mystery and promise. Yet to go there would be to destroy the magic; the forest becomes just trees, the misty meadows become nothing more than fields of grass, and hill become a chore to climb. 

You have always been that alluring horizon that I cannot help but wish to visit and explore. You are towers of an unvisited city gleaming in the setting sun. You are the river sprung from snow capped mountains running its course through untamed lands and over breathtaking falls. You are wind swept plains and deep quiet woods. You are the rainstorm, and you are the bright warm sunshine. 

To venture to your lands and get to know you might break the spell of allure and dispel the intrigue.  That is the risk one must take, and I could not stop myself. You are the enigma that breaks the paradox, for to visit you is only to discover that greater mysteries and magic are always just beyond my sight. Even the places where I have visited change, familiar yet not completely the same. The earth shifts underneath me even when I am not moving. You change the colours of the flowers and the direction of the wind. The calm becomes a storm only for the storm to give way to bright sunshine. And I am amazed.

I do not want to change your landscapes; to erect no structures, to move no hills nor change the courses of streams. I want to breath your air and listen to your voice in the trees. I want only to see the wild lands and to know them as they are. But even to tread here as lightly as I can is to part the veil of mists and to leave my footprints. Even the shadow I cast is a change to your sunshine that I cannot help. 

You are the distant vista on the horizon. You will always be the unexplored country. There are lands and seas that can never be reached. You are a dream that changes as soon as it comes into focus. You change and that is the magic.

And I will watch your changing landscapes and all your beauty.

The Man in the Station

The Shimmer

 To The Lady on the Train,

Union Station used to belong to us. It was a place where we spent time with each other, talking, crying, laughing - but mostly our time was spent learning about each other. 

It is there where I first commented on your eyes after marvelling at how changeable they are. I remember a time we sat on dingy seats in a quieter corner waiting for your train to board. Your eyes were oval pools of shimmering light brown. It’s as if that shimmer is a veil that separates this world from one far more mysterious and magical. And that is when I started falling into the universe that you contain. I fell into your place of wonders and I have never left. 

I have seen those eyes only a dozen times. Oh, I have seen your eyes where they shine brilliantly, and I have seen your eyes half mooned and soft. I have seen your eyes round and hard and black as obsidian. In all the shapes and hues and combinations of your eyes I have only been drawn further into your mystery. It is dizzying in the best way.

Tonight I looked into your eyes and you told me to stop. I was falling, as I always do and you could see it. Maybe I am crazy and perhaps I am wrong, but I thought that I could see a hint of that shimmer in the bright of your smiling eyes. I wanted to just stand there, close to you, feeling the warmth of your arm against mine, falling into your eyes and letting the world vanish. I could have stood there for hours just seeing only you and feeling only my heart racing. I was already lost.

I think of your eyes often. I think of the colours and shimmer. I think of the shapes and the light. I remember seeing and think of your face and I try to hold onto every moment. In dreams I can see your face and your eyes. I see you best in dreams where I can linger and fall freely.

And I will never stop dreaming of you every night of my life. 

The Man in the Station 

What I know

 Even under the baggy grey rolled waist sweatpants…

Despite the two times two large shirt…

Beyond the wild and untamed curls…

I know the lines and curves of you. 

I know the arches and the softness of your skin.

I know and the yielding strength of your limbs. 

Behind your eyes of changing shapes and hues…

Despite the tilt and angle of your face and how your curls tumble…

Beyond the playful small smile and the line of your jaw…

I know the emotions that swirl within. 

I know the sounds of your sighs and release. 

I know the scent of your skin and the taste of your kiss. 

The things we cannot show reveal the things we cannot hide. 

Autumn morning commute

 To The Lady on the Train,

Autumn has held off until the last moment and it seems that all the leaves are dropping at once. The corners of curbs and fences and stairs are the gathering places where the wind has brushed them aside. Sidewalks and lawns are splotched with yellows, rusts, and browns. 

The morning has come dark and wet and the sounds of the city are muffled. The streetcar I ride in is a bubble of contradiction to the world beyond the windows. Inside the lights are too bright, the babies cry, and in the eyes of the commuters only a tenseness or a deadness behind their eyes. 

Along early morning Queen street, the streetcar pulls us into the city past storefronts and cafes. As the city wakes up, lights from coffeehouses illuminate the baristas and the few early customers getting their caffeine fix. Their movements are slow and deliberate. No one wants to fully wake up just yet. The wet pavement shines like stars reflected in a river. 

I want to get off the streetcar to walk the wet pavement, to amble and dream, and to enter into one of the cafes. I imagine standing on a worn wooden floor and having my head filled with the scent of rich fresh ground coffee. But I am already late. There will be no one handed warmth and shimmering lights for me. 

Already the sky is brightening to a dull flat grey. The lumbering car squeals around the corner onto King. I have arrived and I step out into a world brighter, but lost of colours. I have arrived at a place of speed that goes nowhere. 

The Man in the Station

In Dreams

Angel,

As is the way of dreams, time and places and people can shift on you; placing you into new scenes from moment to moment. In my dreams last night they shifted like beach sand under my feet; there was nothing solid. The dreams moved from one scene to the next, sometimes gracefully or sometimes abruptly. The only constant North Star was that you were there. Your bright eyes and your mischievous smile - and the press of your presence that makes my heart race and dizzies my senses. 

Even in dreams you make light and air come alive. 

Even in dreams I can feel the press of your presence. 

A Special Day

To The Lady on the Train,

If I told you that your eyes have not changed, that would be the truth and yet not quite right. 

Your eyes are always changing; from moment to moment. They change shape, but more miraculously, they change colour and hue. what is constant though, is the universe that lies within the depths of your eyes. It is astounding to anyone lucky enough to pay enough attention to witness it. 

And what could I give to you on your birthday, you who has given so much to me? I have no small thing to give to a woman to  whom I would give the world if she did not already contain all the mysteries of the universe. 

The best thing that I have to give you is just my love. And that you most definitely have, and will have. 

Always. 

The Man in the Station. 

The T-Rex

The T-Rex

I once met a T-Rex

He seemed a decent chap.

He asked me for directions

As he didn't have a map.

He said that he was going

to a place called Mount Tummuck.

And now I'm going with him.

By riding in his stomach.

 

Masks

 

Truth

 To The Lady on the Train,

You probably won’t believe it because you’ve lied to yourself for longer than I have been able to tell you the truth. You have always been pretty. The spark that shines in your eyes has always been there. The light that radiates from your smile has always been there. You are beautiful. You have always been beautiful. Those who did not see, did not look. 

The Man in the Station

Okay - it needs work...

To The Lady on the Train,

Should you ever believe that your beauty as dimmed from age, or grey, or wrinkles, or any other silly cosmetic excuse, I will be here to tell you emphatically that you are wrong.

Sure it is easy to see the scars and the blemishes on the skin.

And we fight them because we fight all the demons and doubts within.

So really it isn't the hair that we dyed or rolled down our sleeves so that our scars could hide.

It isn't these outer manifestations of the lives that we lived that are to be judged as the standard of ourselves that we give.

It's the inked that's been etched into our skin that lets our inner voice out and free to sing.

It's the tears rolling down cheeks and fists clenched in a rage that show to the world how our hearts are engaged.

Its the smiles and voices whispered or lifted in song that shout to the world that we are here and we are strong. 

I see all of these things in you and infinitely more. I see in you someone I adore.
So dear lady, when all's said and done it's not just your looks over which a heart's won.

You are beautiful and this is true. But there is so much more that beauty to you.

The Man in the Station

A funny, unexpected thing...

To The Lady on the Train,

Because of you, I found out that I have a voice that I did not know that I possessed.

Because of you, I found out that there is a passion that I did not know could exist.

Because of you, I found out a new way of looking at the world around me.

Because of you, I found that one could be found and lost in the same moment.

Because of you, I found out what it's like to be alone with another while standing in the middle of crowd.

Because of you, I found out what an obsession can be.

Of all the unexpected happenings and consequences of knowing you, it is the minor ones that surprise me the most. 

Because of you, I found out that I have a thing for grey curly hair, half tamed and almost wild.

Because of you, I found out that eyes, and freckles, and the feel of a strength beneath soft skin can cause me hold my breath.

Because of you, I found out that I welcome the unexpected.

The Man in the Station.

In Dreams

To The Lady on the Train,

As is the way of dreams, time and places and people can shift on you, placing you into a new scene from moment to moment. Dreams can be remembrances of the past, hopes or fears for the future, or pure impossible fantasy. In my dreams last night, they shifted like beech sand under my feet and the only constant North Star was that you were there. 

There was a dream that was part past, but not an exact memory. We lay together in the afterglow which could have been memory, but I traced pattens of ink on your freckled shoulder – the expression of your heart etched in ink upon your soft skin. I trailed my fingers along your spine, cupped your breast to feel a hardening nipple in my palm.  I kissed the back of your neck where a grey tangle of your hair could brush my cheek.  

In another dream, we sat in a car stuck in traffic. I was driving and you beside me, turned in your seat toward me. We did not touch, but our arms were close enough to feel the heat and electricity pass between us. I turned toward you to look upon your face and immediately fell into the smile of your eyes, dark, mischievous, and devastating. The traffic moved and you placed your hand into mine. It was not a car that we have been in together, but somehow in the dream it belonged to one of us. I don’t know where exactly we were going but the drive was a happy one.

I would dream these dreams every night if I could. I would commit them to waking memory in a way that somehow seems to elude me more that I wish. I would have you see them exactly as I do, complete with all my innermost thoughts and feelings. I would share with you the lasting impressions you make upon me.  I would show you how in my waking hours, I wrestle with the longing and wanting to return to those dreams.

The Man in the Station

Marked

 i would have your name etched upon my skin 

but anyone who can see me

can already see

that your name is already tattooed on my heart

London Cold

 To The Lady on the Train,

I have landed in a strange city of overcast skies and confused streets. It does not feel altogether foreign but the familiarity makes the unfamiliar feel even stranger.

There are no straight roads. There is no sky. The building press upon you, the cars come from every direction, people are either not to be seen or crowding your every step. It is an ordered chaos where direction seems to have no meaning. 

One cannot navigate this place by latitudes and longitudes. There is no sense of direction; no north, south, east, or west here. The streets all claim to have names, but dammit if I can find them. There are tiny alley ways that lead to stores and pubs, alive with people milling outside, drinks in hand. There are huge limestone buildings that stand right on the sidewalk with mysterious heavy ornate doors leading to a ... well ... who knows what it might lead to. 

I am here to work and work is a distraction from the toil of being here without you.

Would you mind if I pretended that you were here with me? It would make the cold less so. It would make the crowds disappear. It would turn the ally ways into adventures and the city into our playground. The days would be for exploring the city and our nights would be spent exploring the mysteries that we do not even realize that we possess.  

Would you mind if I pretended that I was someone else, someone who could have you here with me? 

You are that girl, but I'm not that boy.

The Man in the Station