It’s 2.00 a.m.,
and I’m stuck in
a bus station.

It’s curfew time
for cheap interstate transport.

No buses are departing.
None are arriving.
The dispatcher has
long since gone home.
The café is shuttered.

It’s hard to sleep
in this cramped seat,
even with my backpack
for a pillow.

And there’s a cop
does the rounds,
pokes stomachs
with his blackjack,
snarls, “Have you got a ticket?”

It’s another five hours
until the next bus leaves.
The red-eyed coked-up guy
sitting opposite me
looks like he’s been waiting
years for his.

A baby screams.
A homeless guy recites
the alphabet loudly.
Another smells like
a distillery at one end,
a sewer at the other.

It’s the kind of company
for which solitude was invented.