The Elderly in Transit

You drowse in the rhythm of the JR train’s click over the tracks opening your eyes briefly as the train hushes into another station.

This half-consciousness, more like forced meditation on an icy morning than real sleep; you draw out a long over due yawn as Koizume Station drifts past.

With eyes now open, green and alien to the dominating browns you watch for your stop through the window.

A row of half sleeping Japanese, faces tight as concrete, are reflected back at you in the window.

You wonder why the softness of a child’s nap always eludes them on the sleepy late afternoon trains.