The Bus

Hi,

Today I would like to share a poem, I have started writing through my hypervigilance and anxiety. This was written on the bus...

The Bus 

I never know which bus I fear more.

The full one, where the doors fold open and my eyes begin their work before my feet have even stepped inside.

Who is looking? Who is watching? Who is too close? Who will sit beside me? Who reminds me of someone I'd spend a lifetime trying to forget?

Every face becomes a calculation. Every movement, a possibility. Every smile, a question.

Or the empty one.

The one where silence echoes and every stop feels like a held breath.

Because then, I wait.

Not for my destination.

For the doors to open.

For the footsteps.

For the moment someone climbs aboard, and I wonder—

Are they safe?

Or will I spend the next twenty minutes planning how to escape without anyone ever knowing I needed saving?

An empty bus has no witnesses.

A full bus has too many strangers.

Trauma doesn't ask which danger is real.

It prepares for both.

So while everyone else sees public transport,

I see exits. Mirrors. Distance. Hands. Voices. Numbers. Escape routes.

I don't travel from one place to another.

I travel between possibilities,

hoping today I guessed right.