The Train | Teen Ink

The Train

January 10, 2011
By Iriqtaq SILVER, Sioux Falls, SD, South Dakota
Iriqtaq SILVER, Sioux Falls, SD, South Dakota
6 articles 0 photos 2 comments

Favorite Quote:
"I'm afraid you've gone mad, completely bonkers! But I'll tell you a secret: All the best people are." --Alice in Wonderland, 2010


There's a boy on the train,
He ran away from home,
He took his father's pain;
He stole his mother's tone.
His sister saw him leave.
She waved at his shadow.
He left her there to grieve
Out her open window.

There's a mother on the train.
She doesn't know the father.
Her baby has no name,
At the moment it's just a bother.
A reminder of her shame,
The bulge is in her way.
With whomever she has lain,
She shall never, ever say.

There's a girl on the train.
Beneath her sleeves are marks.
Marks of her lover's good aim,
And two she gave herself in the dark.
Her perfect mask of cosmetics
Bruises her even more
Her honey's violent antics,
His shouts of "b****" and "w****."

There's a musician on the train.
He strums for glances and cash.
He sings of love and rain,
In his youth he was brash.
He dreamed of his name in lights.
But reality is unjust,
Our lives are full of fights,
Of injustice and mistrust.

There's a man on the train.
he smokes a cigarette.
To his wife, the smoke is a pain;
To his lungs, a deadly threat.
The cells inside his chest
Have mutated beyond control.
The heart within his breast
Will soon pay the toll.

There are stories on the train.
Each story has its cast,
Its tragedy and fame,
Its future and its past.
There are people on the train,
You can learn each person's tale,
We're all connected, one big chain.
Without this chain, we fail.


The author's comments:
All right, now that you've probably already read it or are ABOUT to read it, don't you DARE take it the wrong way. And I don't mean dirty, you terrible, perverted high school terrors!! No, what I mean is this: this poem is not a "Let's reveal reality in shocking form!" poem, it's a "THINK, DAMMIT!" poem. I really want this message to get through: EVERYONE has a story. Every ordinary person you meet in every ordinary situation has a story. The pimply kid bumped into you in the hall, the old guy who may have stared awkwardly at you, the oddly ugly woman in the school office, the jerk-face kid who called your best friend white trash... All of them have stories, too.
So... In the end, I guess... just, think about everyone else for a change. THINK about other people's stories.
How do you think you get friends? You think about their stories. Just... consider it.

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