*

People never push me into doing things
I don't want to do. So I go like a railway guard:
snug in the last of a line of carriages,
left to myself and my own devices.

Sometimes, something might draw my attention:
a goods train bound in the other direction,
the unreadable name of an unmanned station, and sometimes,
if forced, I'll be pressed into action;
to sign for a parcel or take on diesel.

I shall never be one for the clipping of tickets,
or the chеcking of toilets, or the passing of comments.
I shall sit, to see from hеre the signals
changing, to say nothing
of the parallel lines converging, and fading.