The Exchange -- THE POETRY PARLOR

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Subject: The Exchange

Author:
Novi Wan (aka Scott Novack)

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Date Posted: 13:35:21 01/17/02 Thu

I really want to make an image for this, but I haven't gotten around to it.

I wrote this in college while waiting for a train to take me to an interview. The weather was bad and the train was late, so I already had an idea of how the day would go.

The train station is 30th Street Station in Philadelphia, PA, circa 1988.

-------------------------------------

The wind blows and the water drips
and the public phone on the platform rings
for no one in particular.
The pigeons are gray.

A train arrives, not mine, of course,
with a screech that would make the pigeons fly
except that they ignore it.
The train is gray.

Red-haired woman with a big suitcase,
a pillar of independence as she boards the train
struggling through the thin doorway.
Her suitcase rolls.

Car 971 digests its commuters
with a satisfied exhalation of rust-colored steam.
It will be hungry again by Downingtown.
The train rolls.

Waiting for the late train for a questionable interview
while my breath swirls on a drizzling January morning.
An opportunity lost. A poem written.
An even exchange.

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Replies:

Subject	Author	Date
Re: The Exchange	The Madpoet	16:23:42 01/17/02 Thu