NaPoWriMo Day 27: A new chapter

 
Day 27 of the NaPoWriMo challenge at www.napowrimo.net.
 
Prompt: Today we’d like to challenge you to write your own poem that describes a detail in a painting, and that begins, like Auden’s poem, with a grand, declarative statement.
 
I chose Turner’s 'Rain, Steam and Speed' painting (1844).

 

A new chapter
 
Rain, steam, speeds the passage
of time, unheeded, a heady sprint 
into the dust of evening’s song,
an emptying of the greyest clouds.
 
Feel the slight of waiting here
in the station, a huddled pile of clothes.
Suitcase bulging, ticket in pocket,
but he was never going to show.
 
Watch the destinations click down
as you count the years on one hand.
You read all the places out loud until only
one train is left. It won’t wait forever.
 
All steam spirals. It fills the spaces,
the in-betweens, the maybes, lost faces,
all traces of the times even you forgot,
seeks to smother all memory of them.
 
You could stay, but there is no reason,
so you join the departures at the gate.
For there is steam and there is speed,
and there is the rain to make haste in.
 
It washes the dirt from the windows,
your eyes and your skin. It strips clean
the days, the months you stood waiting
until you lost more than just time.
 
You spit on your finger, wipe your shoe,
smooth your skirt, unpin your hat,
open your coat and settle in. You’ve far
to go but already feel lighter.
 
Stone bridges are for crossing,
towns are for leaving. The river spreads
below you, hills rising either side.
Unkempt trees sway, throw blossom away.
 
Each season has a reason, keeps bed for the night.
You open your book to the first chapter,
read the title, see the whole page inked in,
unlike the one you’ve embarked upon.
 
Copyright Vickie Johnstone, April 28, 2025