When you ride a train, it’s your natural state.
In Japan the Shinkansen is frictionless and quiet, a heartbeatless vein through which you flow quietly. In Oakland it’s a rickety BART driven like it’s bulling its way through trash ducts in the centre of the earth. In London it’s a Tube train stopped like a clogged artery holding your heart ransom, stymying breath. All trains are life. You can ride next to someone who will talk until they are done and you’ll think they are so great, so all encompassing, so knitted with life. Then they alight. You know then it was like looking at an eclipse of the sun directly; so overwhelming that you went blind. You are stuck riding that train forever, and if they are ever in your carriage again you might feel it, but you cannot see them, and they removed the need for you to invent words. Now you can only change trains at the end of the line. Change trains until the stars explode. Change trains. Change. Change. Change. Change.