New year express

When the train rolls
through the starry prairie of the night
the headlights reap
the bright fireworks of new year’s eve
the rumbling sound
making vainglorious announcements
alarming the golden fireflies
that shuttle between compartments
the ancient track writes loneliness
perhaps only fireflies
know this kind of quiet
as you listen closer
the whales are swimming in the blue back of beyond
singing happily
the elk tread on broken granite
the breeze blows through the flowering mounds
fuchsia on the horizon
full of boggy confusion
you and i
on this avowedly aimless train
watching the jaded sun fade
into magnificent winterscape
leaving behind the rugged mountains
and whispers of the mysterious twilight
looking at the cold frigid screen of my phone
no clue where
the road ahead will lead to
one thing is clear
your eyes reflect a universe
the light of your former tears
deadens when you walk away from the station
is it the thunder
or the trembling of my heart
the train feels like a dart of a bullet
fired by heartache
at the end of the line
when passengers walk out the door
time ceases, in a flash
people who have entered
the other side of the dimension
would you still hark back
gentle things of the past.

Route

It’s not the temptation
anymore, there’s
no more exhilaration
I’ve grown accustomed to seeing
the scenery
along the road
my gaze has become sluggish
my heart is getting closer
and closer to numbness
there hasn’t been a destination
where i belong even though
the denouement is still far away
my journey has
still quite a stretch of distance
i need to walk on
i am the lonely
lonesome traveler
without much at all
whether it’s a headwind
a tailwind
the seasons and me
after all we have different
objectives and purposes
those landscapes
are used to seeing the varying
colors of the gale
unlike me
at most my hair is blown about
untidy
and my clothes be
bedraggled
on the road i walk
the two sides are mostly
fields or farms
a mountain or a river
hillsides are either green or yellow
and the water is either in a hurry
or it’s been severed
and wheezing
sometimes the scenery will
take roots some people’s hearts
and grow a different genus of charm.
sometimes even if it’s beautiful
yet for people who know not gratitude
nor appreciate the appeal
will appear to be arid anyway
the scenery may be similar every year
but the feeling of watching it is never duplicated
when the waves lap the shore
so solidly
it is sensational and momentous
from the berm i see
the span is mighty
the vicissitudes are vast
the flowers are too arresting
the water is too wide
i am too small
and still pining.

©2022, ChinHooi Ng.