Ghost Train

Ghost Train

So badly over-grown and deserted,

The fact is there’s very little left to see.

So hard to make out what went on here,

And how crowded this place used to be.

Here, beyond the fence, where grasses grow thick,

Lies a gravel track-bed that gives away a clue -

There - you can just make out the old station,

Where once the old branch-line ran through.

There’s no rails, nor any sleepers,

Revealing the place’s one-time function,

Nor the steam trains which left from here,

Wheezed up to the bend, then on to the junction.

Passengers, parcels and packages

On the up train, sometimes the down,

Carried from here in the country,

To their many purposes in the big town.

My dad used to come here in the mornings,

To bring the milk down from the farm,

Sending it in great churns to the city,

To keep it cool, and safe from any harm.

He had a job to be here on time,

Driving the old tractor down the lane.

Sometimes he had to race to the station,

In order to meet that early milk train.

In some ways it’s not so long ago,

But the line succumbed to the usual fate,

With the land sold off to developers,

That’s now sitting under a housing estate.

But it’s strange how the mind can play tricks,

How, when it’s wet, the coal I still smell,

And when the wind blows in the from the West,

There’s the sound of the old station bell.

There’s the steam, the oil and the smoke,

Of the engine waiting the signal to leave,

The whistle of the guard, the slamming doors,

A bustling scene that’s easy to believe.

And sometimes in the lonely night-times,

Maybe it’s a dream, or perhaps it’s quite true,

But I’d swear I can hear rattling milk-churns,

And the scream of the ghost-train passing through.         

 Copyright Andy Fawthrop 2014