Bitter wind claws against your extremities,
as you wait for the 11:30 bus to Southwich.
It’s already late.
You squint impatiently at the end of the street,
waiting for headlights.

The cold has begun to draw the life
from the tips of your fingers and toes,
and you would give anything for even the slightest warmth,
even the horrid coffee in the employee’s lounge at work,
bitter and charred, with a slightly chemical aftertaste that
no amount of sugar and cream could stifle.

The streetlamp over head vibrates and clicks,
Irritating and painful to the ears.
until pop, the light evaporates
submerging you in shadows.
The only light is the dim crimson pulses
of the traffic light on the corner,
and the pale shimmer of the moon.

You stare up into the starless sky above,
a feeble attempt to distract you from the
last wisps of heated breath escaping away into the night,
and the creeping prickles of numbness
gnawing at already raw cheeks.

The moon, a frosted ivory mirror,
beckons you upwards, its pallid lumosity
a welcome smile in a sea of black.
As you gaze transfixed,
you feel as though the only thing stopping you
from being lifted off the cement,
away from every rule, every restriction,
and the gravity of societal pressure,
is those goddamn clouds.

They swim, unconnected, translucent,
on the horizon.
The thin gossamer sheets exist only
to deny you entrance to the heaven above,
contain your being to this existence.
All you can do it wait.
wait to get out of the cold,
to get out of the dark,
to get onto the bus.