Page 13 - Poems

WESTERN LINE

WHERE WAS I?

ne day there will be no blood on the tracks
Oexcept in a Dylan song,
one day one hundred and eighty-nine people
will rise from their deaths
and return unmaimed to catch the trains again.
North from Churchgate.
Five-fifty fast local.
North from Churchgate.
Five-thirty-seven slow local.
Five-thirty-seven Virar Fast.
Five-fifty-seven Virar Fast.
Khar Road-Santacruz
Bandra-Khar Road
Jogeshwari
Mahim Junction
Mira Road-Bhayander
Matunga Road-Mahim Junction
Borivali

It all depended on where you were and where you were going.

North from Churchgate,
you always took the five-fifty fast local to Borivali.
Borivali
of the national park with the scrawny lions in their cages.
You were on the five-thirty-seven fast from Churchgate to Virar.
It was six-thirty-five when you lost a leg and your friend his life.

Meanwhile at six-twenty-four,
at Khar Road-Santacruz
you were waiting for a date.
It was the eleventh of July, two thousand and six.
All figures needed to be written in words in order to numb their
sharp edges, their mangled reminders.
Even upper-case hurt, but veracity demanded that place-names
stay upright despite the shattering of fixity.

You said, when they aimed the mike at you the morning after:
I have no choice. I am fearless.
You said: I was on board the six-o-eight, the train bombed at Bandra.

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