rly stn

The man opposite looks as if he is going to cry. I cannot work out if he is sad or he just has eyes that are that way inclined.

The next passenger along is dressed as a cowboy. His jeans are too pressed and blue for him to have seen any action, the leather on his boots unscuffed, his biceps sculpted by bench pressing in a sterile gym, not hauling in cattle on bone dry landscapes that stretch to infinity

The signal is patchy. I’m trying to listen to music but it flicks on and off. The effect is like a strobing dream. At once I’m somewhere else, amongst the soundscape and next moment, I’m listening to the noise around me. I can’t concentrate on one thing or the other. The voices are just an abstracted chatter. Words cut in half.

From a factory I have never noticed before burst a small scurry of corvids. They circle a small metal chimney and rest again. There’s something apocalyptic about the grimy aluminium and moss covered corrugated iron with a swirling crown of carrion birds above it.

A lady across the aisle wears a faded cap. It has a grubby embroidery emblem that celebrates a long gone title triumph by an American sports team. I wonder if it means anything to her or not, whether she was once there, halfway across the world drinking in victory or not. I could ask I suppose but if she says no, the question will hang there, a strange intrusion and, if she says yes, then she’ll assume I’ve got some shared interest in the team or the place.

The embankment are beginning to seeth with life. From here, you’d be forgiven for believing that the world was all chlorophyll and aphids. An endless thicket, a sprawling woody war that has played out for endless summers. The only tell tale signs of civilisation are the fences that atop the view, but even then, they look to be losing a battle to stems that rocket upwards and grab them like some terrible version of a nightmare from the sea.

I lean back. There is something about a train that lulls everyone into a blankness. The music is still flitting on and off in my ears. I alternate between looking out the window, taking such an angle as to render everything a dizzying blur of texture. Gorse yellow, brick red and concrete neutrality slide past like a fairground ride vision. When that begins to unsettle, I turn my head and scour passenger faces for a sign of an expression.

There isn’t one.