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Sally Read

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Journey

Each fist beat of this train is distinct,
the lub-dup hammer clear at full speed.

It’s dark: through the window suburban lights
are numerous and dull as spiders’ eyes.

The intercom hisses but no-one speaks.
I think of our legs cleaving

with the stuck delicacy of crane flies,
then suck in a little air to inflate

my lungs, still crushed from the weight
of your chest. I’m punch-drunk,

weathering the square-cornered swings
of a ghost-train. I’m coffined

in this rust-pinned torso
passing the black bridge topped

with brambles of black cast iron,
jutting up to a sky pinkish

with breath and exhaust.
I fight into sleep, head

jolted against the smeared window
and picture myself under you again,

each muscle tacked down like a cable
unable to move. We swing into the station

with the carelessness of a missed step.
I wake to remember the ending,

the inside of me contracting
with the beating of wings.

 

poetrymagazines' note: Journey by Sally Read is published in her first collection 'The Point of Splitting'. Furher information is available from Bloodaxe Books here

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