On the bus going south

This is one of my bus stories and is not what you think...

Days went by like moments; smiling faces pushed through my dreams into what couldn’t be had; something was burning, and no-one would say what it was. Sadness took over from gaiety as I heard sighs of, it’s all been done now except that which calls out from inside, that bends me back again and again to what I can’t lose or explain though I feverishly try.

Laughter invaded from a place I couldn’t see sending a scare through my soul until it screamed in a rain of blood provoking derision from passers-by that passed by outside and who seemed to be entertained and exhilarated by a cruel world so far from theirs; but they hid, from their very own face.

There was a spotlight on mine; it didn’t matter, nothing was real. I say the grave and the fire’s heat is a farce; perspectives change from inside, sometimes movement is apparent, nothing is what it seems even in the poker face.

The night was hot outside and my hands hurt trying to break the illusion; spring would not come to that winter’s calling as all the nights spread slow.

Somewhere along the way I decided to call it a day, even though I couldn’t tell where the hurt came from, even though I can’t tell where it’s all going, where it has all been. That night I slept alone on the seat of the bus.

Life’s vision and death haunted me as I hung on the bus trying to make sense of some mystery that couldn’t be abandoned.

Cheap girls got on and surrounded us drinking wine, laughing and enjoying crude jokes; sometimes a drunk danced on the seats, but it was always like that there, in the space before home, in the place full of poets and dreamers and hangers-on.

“It is said that the ego must die for one to be born again,” I said, thinking again, out loud.

“So be as dust in the death and it will blow away to leave only what was there all along,” she said, rolling up another smoke.

“The trick is to kill the ego without killing you with it,” I said, wondering how much she really knew about this kind of stuff.

“There’s another way to look at it that’s less pain-full: stop feeding it. Simple really,” she said, lighting her smoke up and puffing away.

“So what do you feed instead?” I asked while dodging her smoke rings.

“You’re always going to be feeding something, so the answer must be closer to home. What did you feed before the ego? What was there from the beginning that became buried and hidden over the years as the ego came along to be claimed?”

“How much pain can you take before you cry?” I said without thinking.

“Close your mouth now,” she said and went to sleep.

I sometimes go in circles all day long before I begin to notice, I thought quietly to myself so as not to wake her.

The trouble is, you have to believe in yourself, for if you lose that you lose all forward motion.

A group of incredibles with the rustic nature of old, worn-out ghosts began their warm-up routine and before long there was music in the air.

We’d got off the bus just in time to be entertained.

I had no aversion to that, and it seemed she didn’t either, so we both sat on a hot rock to listen.

They were a bit ropey to begin, but they soon tuned up and then they were all playing the same tune, which is always a good thing to do when playing in a band. But after a while it became monotonous; they were playing the same tune over and over. Once a loop always a loop I guess, reminding me of a girlfriend I had once who drank gin and looped her thinking so that she kept saying the same thing over and over again until it drove me crazy.

This music was a bit like elevator music that’s supposed to calm you down and keep you calm but has the opposite effect until you’re really glad to get out of the infernal thing.

It was at this point that we both had the same idea and looked around to see if we could spot a sign. We were both in luck, for hidden behind some burnt down bushes was a door with the legend in brass on it that said: UP. We both pressed the up button at the same time and in moments we were ascending, which is a jolly nice feeling. We settled down to wait and told each other stories to pass the time.

End of part 14

Image from Pixabay

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