~le Train Envers Poem by Mike Finley

(The wrong train)

You watch the board with the flipping numbers
And suddenly it is your train and you race
To the gate, dragging your suitcase
behind you
And you find the last car and you climb
up the steps
And collapse in your seat as the train
pulls out.
For an hour all is well, the countryside
Clicking by you.
Then you are in Poitiers and the train
starts to slow
And you are seized with fear because
you are on express to Paris,
There should be no stops.
The full horror hits you.
You have boarded the wrong train.
You glance about at the other passengers.
How lucky they seem,
To be going where they are going,
And not having to call Jean-Paul
in the night and say
Come and get me, I’m in Brussels,
I think.