The doors slide open
and I am reminded of how
he sweeps his fingers through his hair.
I sigh. I hesitate.

A man with a blank face watches
as I contemplate lifting my feet
from earth that is trying to swallow me.

"one, please." I say,
only to learn that there is no fare.
I don't even know my destination -
let alone what I'll do when I get there.

I carry a box under my arm.
It holds a weight I am used to, but
one I don't want to hurl around with me
all day, every day.

My eyes meet a seat at the back of the bus,
and they do not travel elsewhere
until I meet the safety it provides.

Lying on the surface,
of the box filled with my messy thoughts,
is last night's diary entry.
The poem I keep rewriting.
A list of things I'm likely to forget,
and another of things I wish I could.

There seems to be nothing outside of my window.
Like we are the only survivors of a sinking ship.

There is a young caffeine addict,
who sits next to his box.
He doesn't face it, he pretends it isn't there.
He just jitters and sips from his coffee cup.

There is an erratic woman of thirty,
who keeps reading and rereading the contents
of her box - letters from an ex lover.
She obsessively turns over the paper,
studies his every word, tries to figure it all out.

The hopeless romantic is writing a poem
for the girl who left him.
He keeps scrunching up his drafts,
discards them in his cardboard box.

The caffeine addict has opened a window.
Paper pages flutter like insect wings.

A rosy cheeked ten year old
is next to join the voyage of the misfits.
Her box is too big for her to carry,
too heavy -

She trips.

The burden, flying from her grasp,
like doves released from a cage.
She tries to collect each piece of paper,
each doodle, each sticky note.
She is frantic.

Someone taught this girl
to be ashamed of the inner workings of her mind,
and if I have learnt anything from school,
it is that not every lesson is meant to be revised.

I glance at my box,
like a book I've read a thousand times,
I only need to skim read to get the story.

I open a window.
The caffeine addict gets the same idea.

Then, simultaneously, we throw our problems
into the air. We let them breathe something fresh.
We let them kiss the night sky.

Suddenly, our destination is bliss.
We think about the postcards
we are bound to send, from forests
and meadows and mountains.

The only constant is the self.
We can build up our walls, but sometimes,
we need to leave the door open.

My mind is a kingdom.
I am learning to roam free.