Poem: A lady on the train

A lady on the train

Once upon an evening fair,
I hopped on a train once I’d paid my fare,
Beside the window there was a lady there,
All wild, unkempt and scraggly hair.

Some said she was mad,
Others insane,
She had a look that was quite inane.
I thought maybe in life she tried, failed and gave up in vain,
And this was a way to hide her pain.

It appeared as though she conversed with someone behind my back,
But I turned around to find no one there.
Who was it then she conversed with?
Maybe strange, lost forgotten friends,
Or perhaps old lovers, now no more?

I caught a waft of my neighbours’ talk,
Whispers of drugs and alcohol,
There I sat and tried to add it all,
But to me it made no sense at all.

What if she actually saw,
People behind me who weren’t there at all,
Was hers the reality I wasn’t living in,
Dead people, ghosts, elves and djinns.

Did she live on a higher plane,
Which made us mortals think her insane,
Perhaps all her troubles and fears were real.
And there were wounds too deep to heal.

All things that don’t conform to our ideals,
We have been taught to castigate,
To look down upon with disdain and hate.

However if we took a lighter stand,
Lent a listening ear, and a helping hand,
I think we’d be better able to understand,
The world is not just from where we stand.
Mukund Palat Rao (July 29, 2010)