Mid-Winter’s Eve

To the Lady on the Train, 

I would trudge miles through waist deep snow to be able to sit by a fire with you. We would let the snow fall and the frost paint the window glass. And the smell of the cold and draft that follows me in will be banished by the kindling flame when coaxed to a roar, matched only by the light of your eyes and the warmth of your hands. 

The silver moon shining on the fresh snow look like the world is blanketed in gossamer and the world is hushed and as soft as your skin and glows the way you do. 

And one mid-winter’s night the outside world disappears. The winter winds blow lonely hearts through city streets, but here we are cocooned in the warm and glow of firelight.  Just to be, no more, no less. Just to be.

The Man in the Station

The 

The Beginning

Angel,

There was a night with food, music, dancing, and polite conversations. There were beautiful people but none could outshine an angel in a red dress, who stood on a stage and showed courage enough to also be vulnerable. She took my breath away.

A few innocent words spoken in another moment of vulnerability and the torch that I had carried since first sight blazed. 

Everything that I thought that I knew suddenly changed. 

No one could ever have imagined or predicted the way that night unfolded. It was in a car of a roller coaster but it was the world that moved around me... us, actually.  All I really remember is you and listening to you and dancing close with you. Nothing else mattered.

And since that one magical night when you changed all the stars I have been the luckiest man alive because I got to know you. 

And still you take my breath away. 

Just me.

One Winter’s Night

To The Lady on the Train, 

The stars are a disco ball; our moon, a red neon sign. The tracks on her soul are runway lights to a heaven, headache, and heartache. 

Sometimes the scars from our youth do not allow us to see the bloom of beauty in the adult we become. 

So we are turning and whirling and the night air is chill. But her body is warm and that will have to do tonight. 

There’s no way to tell if we’re on the train to redemption or ruin and only time will tell. So it’s 90 miles an hour to speed through this night. I pray we chase each other’s nightmares away and the morning is not too far away. 

Whatever will happen, come what may. And tomorrow brings another night. 

The Man in the Station

Road Map

To The Lady on the Train,

The blue veins that lie just under your skin are a roadmap of where my thoughts travel. Your freckles are landmarks to be explored. Your eyes and the sound of your breath are the signposts, the traffic lights, and the caution warnings. And still I would walk off the cliff to find new places. And I would travel the paths back to safer ground and to where you are.

The Man in the Station

Dog Days

To The Lady on the Train,

We are in a heat wave and with the lake effect humidity, it is oppressive. The torpid dog days of summer are aptly named and my black furred, four legged companion pants and dawdles behind me when normally he is eagerly leading the way. We slow our pace since we have no worries of time or better places to be. 

I feel the press of the sun’s rays and the  weight of the air makes walking feel more like swimming. And as usual, you come to my mind and I find my escape. There were times walking beside you, marble floors beneath us, and I swear that my feet did not touch them. Gravity had no hold on me then and I was 10 feet tall. 

And now I hold the memory of you like I would hold your hand, soft and strong and a contained tempest. Even now I can throw off the bonds of earth’s gravity to rise above this heat and feel the way I once did. 

The dog looks at me quizzically and I am pulled back to earth and the press of hot air rising to meet me. His dark brown eyes say that it is time to return home. He is, of course, right. 

The Man in the Station

Spring grey

To The Lady on the Train,

The trees have greened at an astonishing rate and the lawns suddenly insist on a cut.  This spring has sprung with an urgency that has startled me and I feel like I have yet to catch up with it. 

The days have traded weather back and forth, alternating sun and rain, chill and heat. I never know what to expect. Today it is cool and drizzly with the air promising a heavier rain. The sky sits low and has swallowed up the downtown towers of the city that I live in. 

I will head into one of those skyscrapers where today the sky scrapes back. I will ascend into those clouds and disappear with upper half of the building. I too will be swallowed up by the sky. 

The view from the windows of the tower will have shrunk and the close horizon will end in a soft grey wall. There will be no blue lake, no green ribbon of a valley that cuts through the east side of the city. But in the taking away of what is there, I am free to imagine my own world that may be just beyond the grey flatness. 

To see you smiling in the sun, I have only to look past these clouds.

The Man in the Station

All it took is all that there is

To The Lady on the Train,

All it took is all that we know and all that there is. 

From a singularity that expanded and cooled in the Big Bang, a universe was born.

And it only took 13.8 billion years of stars forming and exploding so that their scattered dust could coalesce into our little solar system in our little corner of a galaxy somewhere within this wonder of a universe. Then all it took was for our little world to form and to grow life until it finally reached until now. 

Only now has the universe been able to express it's highest potential in the making of you.

I do not have to give you the world or the moon or the stars. 

They have been here just for you all along.

The Man in the Station

Breaking Down

Verse

If you don’t love me just pretend

For the short ride in the car

Hold my hand the way you used to

The few kilometres aren’t that far

Chorus 

We can’t be broken

I don’t want to let go 

and neither do you 

How’d we end up here

We aren’t broken just yet

We can’t be broken yet

Verse

If you’ll just hold on to me

Then I can hold myself together 

We’ll just drive over these hill

And get us through this weather

I wasn’t ready to let go 

but didn’t know how to hang on.

So it’s roads and rain and us

But I know that your already gone. 

Let the asphalt roll under our wheels

And let’s get through the day 

‘Cause I know what my heart feels

And I know what it would say

As we ride toward somewhere new

Hold my hand and we’ll both pretend 

That we’re both still in love and at beginning 

That we’re still in the middle instead of the end. 

What I did not do but should have done

To The Lady on the Train,

I walked hallways and sat in meetings where I had to pretend that all my attention wasn’t being consumed by a white blouse or the swing of a dress. 

I noticed unnoticed the slant of shoulders, the shape of her eyes, and the playful smile that seemed to ring  something inside of me. 

I sometimes had to speak as if my heart wasn’t pounding and my words weren’t jumbled before they left my mouth just because she sat in a chair or stood up or moved papers on her desk with slender fingers. 

I had to not call out or crumble as she walked past and the world disappeared until it was only her folded arms and sway of her hips. 

I thought that I had to not do all those things. 

But her beauty was all I did see and she didn’t know it. 

It is all I still see. I hope that she know it.

The Man in the Station

She does not see

 To The Lady on the Train, 

She looked down at her hands and what she did not notice was the slender strength of her fingers or the ovals of her fingernails. She did not see the softness of her palms that cup love, nor did she really pay attention to the callouses that prove her hidden steel. 

I do not know what she saw through her eyes that sometimes see so much. But my eyes saw the graceful arch of her neck, roundness of cheek, and the line of her jaw. I saw a woman who is more than she sees. 

The Man in the Station 

Coming through winter

 

To The Lady on the Train,

Though it is cold, the sky is brighter and less oppressive. The mornings have dawned noticeably earlier and the setting sun lingers just a little longer into the evening. We have come through the darkest part of winter. We have come through days where the sun could not break through the storm clouds, and we have come through moonless and starless nights of howling winds piling snow around our homes and hearts. Yet through it all we put shoulder to shovel and kept putting one cold foot before the other to trudge our way out through a place where we can now sense that soon there will be a spring. 

Some souls despaired and lost their way in the darkness. Some grim souls simply held onto the hope that the light would soon return. Still others held close their own little light and let it carry them through. But my dear, you are the rarest and most beautiful of souls who somehow have their own light that radiates, shining the way for others to take courage from. Even in the darkest of days and nights you gather up what light is available and multiply it out into the world. It is seen in your smile. It is seen in your eyes. For those who are lucky enough to know you, it is the warmth that will see them through any cold and darkness of any winter. 

The arc of the sun rising higher in a blue sky is welcomed, and you have helped to pull people through. And you don't even know it. 

The Man in the Station

I’m a Thief

To The Lady on the Train,

It is early morning and dark when I rise from the bed, leaving a cocoon of warmth and you still sleeping. I will feed the cat and walk the dog and they will be contented. In the kitchen with slow and deliberate movements I will as quietly as possible brew the coffee. Into the bedroom with frosted windows now lightening with the coming dawn, I carry a mug of strong dark and aromatic coffee and set it gently on the table beside you. 

You are still asleep, your wild grey hair splayed on the pillow, an arm crooked above your head, and sheets half kicked off leaving you in a long T-shirt outline of your body. You are beautiful, a goddess in repose, and you are a wonder to see and it is an ache to restrain myself. I am about to turn to leave you to sleep  when you shift and turn slightly. Is it the scent of the coffee that has roused you, the lightening of the room, or my presence that has disturbed you? It is here where your body betrays you by the smile that too late you suppress and the hardening of your nipples against the shirt, and the subtle changed scent of you. You shift once more and a knee is exposed from underneath the bedsheet. An invitation. 

I will play this game; you the sleeping prize and I the lover thief. From the foot of the bed, slowly and almost silently I slide under the sheets. Brushing my lips against your ankles and feet I coax your legs apart just a little more to reach your knees. My fingers trace lines on your calves and thighs and my mouth trails kisses on your inner thighs, moving slowly higher. The scent and warmth of you fill me and I am no longer the thief but a willing slave to your desire. 

My arm curls under your leg, my hand pressed to hold your hip and the heat of my breath on the triangle mound of tight curls and all pretense of sleeping is dropped as you sigh, open to me and your hand on the back of my head draws me in. You are warm honey as my tongue finds your folds and the stiff button that brings you so much pleasure. I feel the rhythm of your hips and the press of you on my face. I feel the tightening and letting go of the muscles in your legs, back, and stomach. 

I want to slow, take my time and savour the waste of you; to stay here for as long as possible, to tease you close and then to back away. But I can feel your desire and impatience for release growing, and I will comply. My tongue will dance where you command and your entire body begins to tense. There is holding on, a moment yet an eternity on the precipice of some cresting wave building inside. ‘Don’t stop’ your body commands me and I obey but only quicken my tongue slightly. And here it comes washing over you, every muscle tight, hold, hold, back arches, and then a full body release. 

My cheek rest on your mound and I breath you in. You sigh and pant, trying to slow your breath and here we rest in the glow. You run your fingers through my hair as I cup your breast in my hand. After a few minutes you swing a leg over my head to lay on your stomach. 

I turn to kiss the roundness of your bum and let my fingers draw patterns on your back, connecting the dots of freckles, soft skin over muscles. My palm on the back of your neck, the tilting of your hips and spreading of your legs as I shift myself between them. Our breaths quicken my lips to your shoulder as I enter you from behind. The press of your bum against my stomach and burying myself as deep into as I can and the desire to be deeper still. We give ourselves over to these ancient instincts and let go any restraints to our passions. We thrust and push and pull and let our bodies rule all that we are in this moment. We crash and clasp onto each other. It is raw and wild and we pant and sweat and we don’t know where one ends and the other begins until we both are spent. We come to ourselves and lay holding onto one another looking deep into each other’s eyes. It’s like we let go and lost ourselves and it is here where we can find ourselves again. I will stroke your arms, cheeks, hips; touching you to make sure that you are real and really here. I fall into your smile and I am lost again. 

I will touch you throughout the day to make sure you are not a dream, or to keep me from floating away from this earth. Or both. 

The Man in the Station 

A body of cruelties and kindnesses

To The Lady on the Train,

I inhabit this body and it has shared with me all of its cruelties and kindnesses. 

The greatest of these kindnesses have been the sensation of your soft skin next to mine, the sound of your sighs in my ear, and to watch the dazzle of stars in your eyes. 

And when this body finally fails me completely and expels this ghost, it is these memories that will haunt me. My body’s cruelties of weaknesses and pains will be forgotten and It will be those moments of my body’s kindnesses that become the chains that I rattle. 

The Man in the Station

Happy Other People's Valentine's Day

To The Lady on the Train,

Today is a day that will be recognized by others as a day to acknowledge and celebrate love. We will recognize it though it is not our day. And even though it is not our day, I cannot help but think of you, remember all of the times that we had, and to be reminded that the torch that I carry for you has not dimmed one little bit.

You should know that you are incredible. You are beautiful. You are loved.

The Man in the Station

At a resort

To The Lady on the Train,

I am in a beautiful hot country. The resort sits on a palm tree dotted beach of a sheltered azure bay that faces out toward the vast blue of the south Atlantic Ocean. The people who look after us are as warm as the days. There is good food, music and dancing and singing; games to play and laughter to share. Well tended gardens and pathways throughout, beautiful swimming pools, and a gentle warm breeze. There is hardly anything more that one could want. Hardly, and yet. 

And yet there is something missing. It is the same thing that is always missing. It is that which has left me with this hole that I carry. It is a hole that is the exact shape of your eyes and resonates at the frequency of your voice. 

It will be a week in the sun and sand, away from the snow and cold that awaits our return North. It will be just one more week with you not where I am. 

The Man in the Station 

Happy Anniversary

 To The Lady on the Train,

“If you could, would you want to go back” you once asked me. 

“In a heartbeat. Would you?”

“In a heartbeat.”

And these things are true. But we cannot go back. 

It was 16 years ago today when first we made love on a blanket spread out on a carpeted floor. We were explorers, not knowing what we would find or how incredibly precious our discovery could be. And we did find something that we did not expect, and in truth, could never have imagined. And even knowing what we found, we somehow could not hold it indefinitely. 

Maybe a part of us didn’t believe it could be true. My suspicion is that a part of us didn’t believe that we were worthy.  We are both broken in some way that makes us doubt this the magic could be for us. But it is for us and it is ours, and it isn’t something that either of us will ever be able to lose completely.  We are that magic, whatever that magic is. 

This, our anniversary, is a day that is shared with an event that is as solid and immovable as granite, and should not be shared; it cannot be shared. I now consider a different day as our anniversary because in many ways it was a day just as important. When we were faced with a hard decision, we chose us. March 3 we spent in a small house that we borrowed for the day. I know that you have replayed the events of that day many times over, as have I.  We stood at the crossroads where every direction held some heartache, but we continued into the unknown even though the safer path would have been to turn back. We were brave that day.  

We have been disbelieving and we have been brave many times through the years and we are still here; we are still in each other’s orbit. I do not know where we will go. I do not know the paths we will take together or apart. I wish that I could see into the future. But I cannot do that any more than I can turn back the clock. And I cannot see the direction you are taking or to what distance it is that you are looking towards. 

I can tell you that I want to find again that sweet sadness that can only come from the knowledge gained by being next to the one that holds your heart; the knowledge that we are all truly alone.  Before there is only darkness, I want to lay beside you to look into the universe in your eyes and feel your warm cheeks with the backs of my fingers. I want to feel the soft brush of your lips against mine and to taste your honey mouth, slow and tender, almost afraid. I want to feel your arms around me and hear your breath and voice in my ear. I want to feel the thump of your heart beating against my own chest. I want to know throughout my entire being if it has all been lost for good; or that by some magic that it has only laid dormant, or perhaps been held down either deliberately or subconsciously.  I want to know if there is some deep buried ember that still glows. I want to be scared and to face that decision again; to raise that ember and fan it to flame, or to let it lie an ember that shall never ablaze. Or even, that there is no ember left.

We have already walked the paths that lay behind us. Whatever the paths before us, we will walk them. 

Come what may. 

The Man in the Station

In a Restaurant

 

In a small restaurant on a cold and windy January, I find myself sitting across from a beautiful woman who does not know all that she holds. There are perhaps 8 small tables that will seat 20 people at most but we are the only people here aside from the chef; the place is all ours and it is perfect. 

The sky darkens outside the north facing window and all of the remaining light has settled on her. The outside has disappeared, leaving only this small room. Then shrinking, the rest of the room falls away, leaving only this one small table and all the remaining light shines from her face. There are no other sounds but for her laughing voice.

A universe in the shape of a woman collapses space and with it time. For me a moment passes, yet beyond the gravity of this table hours have flown by. Having already fallen into her eyes I ached to take her hand, but never would I have the strength to ever let go; the pull of her being too great. 

When finally we leave to walk back to the car, the universe extends no futher that our imidiate circle along our path. Or perhaps it is the sidewalk that moves beneath my feet for I cannot feel the earth. It is not until she departs that the rest of the world is released for me to sense. Cars, people, streets, and streetcars come back to my awareness, and I am left empty.

She is not aware of all that she holds; she has no idea...