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