I can see it in your face.

Cracks laced with troubles

and years of struggle.

With eyes full of regret,

her ducts are of sorrow.

From years of facial facets,

crickets will forever interrupt

the silence of others.

Number 66 arrives,

she doesn’t budge.

Her arms and legs intersect

like the telephone lines

in her mind,

trying to get a decent signal

from the many horrid receptions

from her life.

Faces of sympathy

but thoughts of empathy

surround her because

the barrio knows

of the sun that hasn’t

peeked from the eclipse.

Her children of three

dangle from her shoulders

weighing her down

as if she isn’t already

bearing the burdens of the world.

Finally,

number 524 positions itself

among the bodies.

With aging bones,

she elegantly and forcefully

stumbles on the 524.

With one foot in, she glances at me.

I look at her.

With a painful smile,

she winces as she

climbs the steps,

while I continue

waiting at my stop

with a prompt in mind…