Passenger | Teen Ink

Passenger MAG

August 22, 2013
By mbraneck BRONZE, Verona, New Jersey
mbraneck BRONZE, Verona, New Jersey
3 articles 0 photos 0 comments

There are playing cards on the floor of the car of this over-romanticized train ride that will simply take me home.
We passed over the dirty river near my mother's hometown,
and a nameless man in a sad hat took my ticket.
The sentimental me wanted to ask him if I could please have it
to remember today
but the practical me stopped her
and wrote this poem instead.

This is a prayer
disguised as a poem –
a hope to G-d that I am on the right train

(A nameless commuter behind me
has unknowingly confirmed that this is,in fact, the right train.
I wish I could thank him.)

Now I can breathe, and wonder:
why does no one need the six of spades, or the two of hearts?

The two of hearts is the saddest card –
it is a reminder that every heart needs another
for the deck to be complete.

Is this solitude or loneliness?
Only a ghost shares my two-seater.
A ghost, and Howl.

I am not leaving behind, no,
only heading toward.

The dirty graffiti along the side of the tracks makes me wonder
about the artist's mother.

And if I look out far enough,
past the murky Jersey marshlands,
past the decrepit streets of Newark, home to Ginsberg,
past the prayer to G-d I'm on the right train,
past the rolling hills of some far-off county,
past the ports and abandoned storage warehouses with the windows broken in,
past the lumpy overcast sky –
If I look past all of the falling-down beauty along the NJ Transit rails,
I can see the sunset on some far-off horizon.

From here, it looks like a house fire.



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This article has 5 comments.


Beila BRONZE said...
on Feb. 25 2015 at 2:25 pm
Beila BRONZE, Palo Alto, California
3 articles 0 photos 516 comments

Favorite Quote:
"The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco." -Mark Twain

Sometimes on this site, you read great writing, and you have so much to say about it that you overflow the edges of the comment box with every superlative in the dictionary. Other times, you read Great Writing... and you have no words at all. This is one of those times; suffice it to say, if I could, I'd hug you. This is beyond words.

on Nov. 19 2014 at 9:58 am
theblondechick GOLD, Kingsport, Tennessee
14 articles 0 photos 104 comments

Favorite Quote:
I want to live and feel all the shades, tones, and variations of mental and physical experience possible in life. <br /> And I am horribly limited. <br /> -Sylvia Path

Great work!

on Nov. 17 2014 at 4:05 pm
RedHadan BRONZE, New York, New York
3 articles 0 photos 53 comments

Favorite Quote:
Yes: I am a dreamer. For a dreamer is one who can only find her way by moonlight, and her punishment is that she sees the dawn before the rest of the world.

Beautiful! Extremely well done!  

Orlivee BRONZE said...
on Nov. 7 2014 at 1:01 pm
Orlivee BRONZE, Lagos, Other
2 articles 0 photos 26 comments

Favorite Quote:
Never make someone a priority if they will make you an option.

This is a beautiful rendition.

on Nov. 3 2014 at 4:45 pm
OurVoices PLATINUM, Merrimac, Massachusetts
31 articles 0 photos 34 comments

Favorite Quote:
&quot;It takes courage to grow up and turn out to be who you really are&quot; - e.e. cummings

This is insainly beautiful and well written. Amazing job