WE GET ON THE BUS

all of us, the heavy walkers
slowly pulling themselves up
the steps like an impossible ladder,
and the girl whose face seems half-frozen
in surprise, a kind of perpetual anguish,
the man who carries everything in his sack,
his lunch, his coat, furniture,
his whole house in that bulging bag,
and the woman who talks loudly
as if a strong wind blew through the bus
to make herself heard above the din
threatening us all at once
as we stop, lurching, and then start,
lurching, storing our thoughts
in the little shiny banks of windows,
collecting everyone else's, gathering
ourselves to be delivered up, each one,
to our various weighty destinies.