Our Eyes Are Busy On The Side Of The Streets The Houses, The Trees, And The Passing Scenery Poem by RIC BASTASA

there are conversations in the bus
we keep hearing without paying much attention

their lives are temporary
and they last while we are still inside it

always hoping
when to reach that final destination

our eyes are busy on the side of the streets
the houses, the trees, and the passing
scenery

in a flash of seconds that keep on
changing more like stories about here and there
in pictures

you may keep your silence and then pretend to
the man beside you that you are listening to him

and that is easy, and he keeps on telling you the stories
of his youth, the cares of his wife, the hopes of
his children,

and you would not bother stopping
him or inserting your own version of yourself

who cares anyway? you have your own stories to tell
to yourself which you cannot tell anyone

lest there be no more secrets, no mysteries
lest there will be no longer you to keep and cherish

you know it well, once you share a chapter of your life
it ceases to be you own,

it now belongs not only to the lonely
man beside you, it starts to be owned by the world

this world that owes you nothing
and in return, you too, owe nothing to it.

and then the bus arrives and you step out
and you leave him, wondering perhaps why
you are the listening type.