by Frances Koziar
She waited every Friday, face as lined as the old tracks, joints creaking like the wood of her bench
Some spoke to her, some asked why, but she would only smile sadly and say: Waiting. I
never asked, knew it the moment I saw her, punctual as a clock, recognized, maybe, that look in her dusty old eyes. Everything
must have changed, I thought, perhaps not the bench but the train, the people, the conductor: too young to have weathered all those years, too bright to know how grief can seep into your flesh across the decades, sing a melody too painfully beautiful for you to just walk away. I watched,
how she twirled that old golden band, how she barely seemed to see what she stared at, but I never asked, never joined her as I should have, because my love hadn’t gone by train
FRANCES KOZIAR has publications in 25+ literary magazines, and is seeking an agent for a diverse NA/YA fantasy novel. One of her poems shortlisted for the 2019 Molotov Cocktail Shadow Award Contest, and her poetry has appeared in Acta Victoriana, Snapdragon, and Thin Air Magazine. She is a young retired (disabled) academic and a social justice advocate, and she lives in Kingston, Ontario, Canada.
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