memories of the past

You could almost imagine such an afternoon; a typical Sydney train. The sun, mixing like syrup with the humid stale air coating the insides of lungs, beat down on the shiny plastic blue seats, making it stick to her legs. The empty coke can, occasionally rolling from one side to another at its own leisurely fancy, pierced the echoing silence loudly. The graffiti loped in lewd forms over the walls and ceiling, the vestiges of the colourful inhabitants it had carried.

�Stand clear, doors closing�

She couldn�t sit still, watching the stations, suburbs, and peoples� lives, flash by at incredible speeds. The harsh screeching of metal wheels on track work, discordant clashing of the metal body rocking side to side, unsettling rumblings of a veteran train chugging its way slowly, complaining loudly with each rheumatic joint and brittle bone disturbed. But its complaints were in vain, no one was in the carriage to listen.

She saw, heard, and noticed none of these things. She felt gritted teeth, clenched fists, her face a puzzling landscape of ridges and valleys of frowns. She felt� angry, sad, guilty, resentful, shameful, hot, cold� oh she didn�t know!

�Stand clear, doors closing�

With a fluid motion, she lifted up the lid of her case, felt the familiar bloody green velvet under her fingertips. She traced its lovely contours, the smooth varnished surface, twirled her fingers around the scroll. The touch of the wood warmed to her skin, with its foliage of autumn shades smiling back at her.

She picked up the bow, placed hair on string, and played to her audience. It was no distinct melody, a series of highs and lows that soared fell and cried. Long notes that trembled at the end, then rushed back into motion on the downbeat. A lamenting vibrato that wobbled unsteadily; an hesitating bow that tentatively drew out her heart.

The rumbling of train wheels beat her rhythm, the creaking of the carriage swayed side to side in time with her music. She soothed the old veteran�s joints, cleared the wheezing air in its lungs, and filled its brooding mind with stories of people in other worlds. The carriage breathed as one around her, frozen in a time and space that which only music can create. She paused for an instant, on the verge of changing notes, and thought she heard muffled crying.

2010-09-20
6:18 p.m.
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