Bus

B77 (From Park Slope to Red Hook)

The bus is quiet. A silent bus soothes with its lights half off. Nobody else is there. The driver has gotten off to smoke a cigarette. He has time for two.

This is the middle time. The time to be alone. In seven minutes, the engine will turn and the seat will shake. But for now, we have time to think.

After laughing wine and before brushing teeth
After companionship and before dreams.
After the light of future and before the weight of home.

This is the DMZ. A fat border that gets remapped again and again. Cartographers work overtime to move that edge. Invasions, annexations, and coups move me as do rivers and mountains. Who has time to think when you don't even know where you are?

But now you do because you are on a bus. That is still.

Too cold and too late to walk.
Too cheap to take a cab.
Too awake to go to sleep.

The door swings open and the bearded one is back. He stretches his back like a cat before he takes his springy seat and we roar to life.