He’s hardly glanced at that great wodge of paper,
must’ve been a hedge against fellow passengers talking
or boredom, I notice no phone for his hyperactive fingers.
Endless treescape, Siberian birches enough to flog a nation.
I crouch behind my hedge, the novel I had hopes of relishing.
It works against eye-contact, not against brain-fidget: trees,
more trees, no talking sanctioned in this stuffy compartment
of anxiety. Lookout – action! Up and out in a premeditated
toilet dash, I assume. Can’t resist weighing his paper, weighing
I notice, in a judgemental way. Bounces my book off the scales,
it could be War & Peace – weekly. A massive broadsheet
of short stories, adding up to, well, not adding up.
I picture it as a block of wood, a chunk of tree, which presents
my book as another. Can the print transform its woodiness?
Not this ‘novel’ about which, nothing novel. Wood through
and through. How many on this twenty-three carriage train?
Papers, books, magazines, hankies, toilet paper, paper cups,
I see the real train now, ploughing through the forest, eating.
Verses of Five 