Travelling Alone

There are the creature comforts, of course:
warmth of an iced miniature of gin,
plastic cups filled with dark traces of tea.
They use up time, inner space. Some of it.
Then daydreams … the feeding on longing, memory.
Only in true sleep can you escape them.
Here, you welcome them, leave the door
half-open so they can pass in and out —
companionable, taxing, preoccupying.
You have put your things on the seat beside you,
stacked its emptiness with clutter.
Your hand comes to rest on a satchel
of poems, books — isolating, radial.
Time. As usual, it's passing. When
will you be there? Where? Numbness now.
All the distance you have travelled
swings on to your back as you prepare to leave.
The relief of earth again, every footfall
a mark on a map; the tension of creating
that map, not knowing. Then you give yourself
one moment: stand calmly, in possession,
on a small piece of time. Yourself alone.