the slide

there's a man on a train. and he's looking at me. he's wearing a fedora. i think it's a fedora. it's blue, like how i imagine a whale is. his eyes are the oceanic green of a whale's wake. but the colours alarm me. a bit helpless, his eye's seem to search me for some kind of seam. what alarms me is that he may have found it. a hairline crack of vulnerability just between my collar bone and my jaw. so I, in turn, now search for his, turning my own lamps upon his. glasses, square jaw, blue fedora, green eyes, one glove, one mitten, white, black, a full set of teeth. thin. the teeth. there. below his right eye, in a groove adjacent to his nose, a moist shine. a dampness. ground sodden with more night-time dew than the sun's warmth can lift. why is he laughing? i only notice once he's stopped. before i am aware that i've been sleeping, he has handed me a note and left. i am at herne hill. i have missed my stop by three stations. i have a stranger's note in my top pocket. I unfold a drawing of a slide, half in, half out of the light. hard to say whether you'd be passing from or into the dark. i cannot help but feel. yes, curious, or confused, but some other thing i cannot put words to. this is why i've asked you to stay.