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A Train for Joy​​

 

For years I’ve tried to write

the night I was twenty-one and done,

was standing at the train station

in DeLand and about to leave for good.

 

With my duffel bag and backpack

I looked down the tracks—signal lights

to the north, signal lights

and darkness in the other direction.

 

It was August, the roads were warm,

the day’s dust stayed where it was, not a leaf moving.

Around ten I heard it and turned

to catch its light showing up to the south.

 

Have you ever stood with the future

coming for you like that—been taken 

head-to-toe by a desire so sharp

and sweet you wanted to keep it forever?

 

Have you ever tried to go back and live

inside it one more time? Have you

tried and tried—like this—

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Matthew Murrey is the author of Bulletproof (Jacar Press, 2019) and the forthcoming collection, Little Joy (Cornerstone Press, 2026). He has recently had poems in Dissident Voice, One, Anthropocene and elsewhere. He was a public school librarian for more than 20 years and lives in Urbana, IL with his partner. 

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