Lowly Faint 1980 Poem by Terry Collett

Susan had found the ferry trip
over the Channel,
harder than she thought:
she'd felt sick
and couldn't eat or drink,
but sat downstairs
in the lounge,
either pretending
to be asleep,
or gazing at passing people
and wondering where
they were going or doing.

Jude was on her mind
most of the time,
how he was or
where he'd gone
after leaving her
on the platform
and seeing the train
off out of sight.

She had looked
from the train window
until he was a mere blot
on the far off landscape.

Now as she was on a train to Paris
she found she couldn't stop
thinking of him,
how she should have told him
about being a nun
on the outskirts of Paris,
but she hadn't,
just let him kiss her,
full of hope that
when she returned
from her journey
she'd say yes to his
marriage proposal
and that life would proceed
as he had thought.

And there was those
odd couples on the train
each of them escaping
like she was from someone
or something
to go somewhere
as if to escape.

She looks out the window
of the train to Paris
watching the scenery change,
hearing people around her
speak French and smile
and laugh,
only vague thoughts
of the convent
she was going to,
what would she have there,
what she would feel like
when the convent doors
closed behind her.

And her parents
they had not wanted her
to enter the convent at all;
Mother with her you'll
be dead to us and Father
saying I never thought
a daughter of mine
would waste their life
amongst lonely old woman
and making her feel
a traitor other than
a possible future saint.

The rush
of the French train
makes her feel
slightly giddy
and lowly faint.