“Bus Stop”

On By Mike U.In Poetry

“Bus Stop”
© 2025 by Michael L. Utley

she stood there
stoic and still
as a river rock cairn
at the crossroads
bus stop
every afternoon
alone
save for her
reluctant shadow
that always seemed
to pull away from her
clawing at the gravel
to unpin itself from this
dirty-faced girl
with willow whip arms
and a mangled knot
of corn silk hair

she stood there
by my grandfather’s
mailbox with the
shot-up targets
and broken beer bottles
glinting dully
in the weeds of the
four o’clock sun like
dusty brown cataracts
and waited for someone
who never arrived
staring soundlessly as the
folding school bus door
juddered shut
and exhaust fumes
enfolded her
in a hydrocarbon miasma

she stood there
in her too-big
ratty plaid jumper
of indeterminate hue
and mismatched sneakers
and scab-caked knees
rooted to the ground
like some obscure totem
some miniature monolith
weather-worn
eroded
her features smoothed
by the passage of eons
at this nowhere bus stop
somewhere east
of benignancy
paused between
moments
stranded between
the dots of the ellipsis…

she stood there
as we piled off the bus
each day
a mass of larval humanity
gummed together
in sweaty profusion
and exquisite ignorance
and ran past her
down red dirt roads
that sliced through
cheat grass and junipers
sage and pines
kicking up dust
in our manic wakes
a mindless stampede
of vacuous hubris
and nascent dark desires
our souls’ eyes shuttered
against grace and mercy
our young hearts
already blackened
by vainglory
we perceived her
incuriously
in our periphery
discerned her
absently
incidentally
our puerile minds
negating her
ripping her brusquely
from the cloth of our
reality

she stood there
waiting
as the cracks
in the world
began to show
arrivals
departures
childhood’s horrors
comings and goings
day and night
week after month
after year
after generation
and I recalled her
vaguely
a tenuous mirage on the
distant silver horizon
of youth
and my children
and their children
spoke cryptically
of the uncanny silent girl
at the bus stop
until her novelty wore off
and she disappeared
from their collective consciousness
as their own childhoods
unwound in a chaotic blur

and the cracks widened
and deepened
and the world spun slowly
to a stop

she stood there
stoic and still
as a river rock cairn
in the withering gloaming
at the end of time
where no bus
had stopped
for millennia
where the damned
no longer
gamboled and
cavorted
where sepulchral silence
clung shroud-like
to the bones
of the earth
waiting for
someone
no one
anyone
and I approached her
my back bent with age
my gait halting
my old man’s eyes
dim and rheumy
my breath a rasping wheeze
and she looked at me
with pallid marbled eyes
and I recognized her
at last
and I sensed
the world sigh
and I took her
cold, ashen hand
as the final
sunset faded
and I waited
with her

39 thoughts on ““Bus Stop””

    1. Thank you, Russ. There are so many Forgotten Ones in this world, indeed. I wish everyone would realize we all matter, every single one of us. I appreciate your kind support, good sir. Enjoy the rest of your week. 😊

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    1. “But in the end, I am glad you took her hand. No one deserves to spend eternity so alone…”

      I agree, Violet. It’s a terrible reality that this isn’t so. Thank you for your generous support, my friend. I hope your week is going well. 😊

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  4. Tranature - quiet moments in nature's avatar Tranature - quiet moments in nature

    What an amazing and powerful poem Mike, the short lines and stanza breaks are so symbolic of the person standing there through time 💜✍️

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    1. Kindest thanks, Xenia. I’ve felt invisible all my life, too, so this piece has some deeper meaning for me. We’re all in this together. I wish we all could really see one another–the world would be such a better place if we could. Thank you for your wonderful support, my friend. Wishing you a good rest of the week. 😊

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    1. Thanks so much, Lamittan. Invisible folks are everywhere, and it’s unfortunate we can’t seem to take the time to simply acknowledge our fellow humans, you know? I appreciate your kind support, my friend. All the best to you. 😊

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    1. Thank you kindly, Carol. This poem is for all of us who ever felt invisible (I’m a charter member of that club). We all matter; we all have value. What a wonderful world this would be if we could only recognize the humanity around us…

      I appreciate you and your sterling support, my friend. Hope your week is going well. 😊

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  7. Whoa, Mike, I don’t even know the words to describe how this one makes me feel. So incredibly sad. The callous tragedy of it leaves me heartbroken. For a child to be so invisible…. It incriminates us all in the greatest failing of the human race – the lack of will to protect and care for our children.

    You poetry is powerful, the imagery impossible not to see, the emotions overwhelming. You take no prisoners and I appreciate the hard-hitting truth of your message. Though your poem focuses on one child, these children stand at the edge of the road everywhere.

    The ending was especially poignant – the regret, the recognition, and obliteration that levels us all. A truly exquisite poem, my friend.

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    1. Thanks so much, Diana. I’ve seen too many of these invisible children throughout my life. Heck, I was one of them (and I still feel invisible). Everywhere you look, you see them, and over time they simply fade away, and that’s a tragedy. We all matter, and when kids feel worthless to the point of being invisible, it really is an indictment on everyone. We can do better, and we must.

      Thanks for your kind support, my wonderful friend. Here’s wishing the rest of your week brings unexpected hope. 😊

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    1. Thanks so much, Joanne. It’s a sad piece, for sure. I’ve felt like an invisible person all my life, so I can relate to the little girl in this poem. I hope your week is going well and the arrival of autumn is pleasant for you (spring is just now knocking on the door here in Colorado). 😊

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  9. Mike, this is to me one of your best pieces yet. It is exquisite in so many ways. Perhaps it is just the timing but it speaks to me like a blaring fire alarm. The loss of humanity and now the sheer non-existence of humanity that is on it’s way to knock on all of our doors, in one way or another.

    These lines really got to me.

    “shot-up targets
    and broken beer bottles
    glinting dully
    in the weeds of the
    four o’clock sun like
    dusty brown cataracts
    and waited for someone
    who never arrived”

    Perhaps it is because I felt like that girl growing up – the one that people looked through. I get the fact that many people could care less about those that seem lost, no one even bothered to ask back then. So grateful to see you writing your heart out my friend. Keep opening up your heart and soul and pouring it out for us to read. I know this is sad but it is also the truth and people experience this behavior every day if they live in a city. I know because I did every day I walked to and from the bus-stop in Seattle which all the companies paid for the bus-ticket but to drive a car was a minimum of $350.00 per month. However, I passed so many people that seemed lost every day that I had to protect my heart or I would have not been able to continue working at what was a dream job for me. The lost are everywhere. Thank you for writing raw and real always Mike. I love your work – I read this one outloud to Scott and he agreed – great stuff.

    Sending our love and blessings to you.

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    1. Thank you, Joni. It hurts to be invisible. I know from experience. I tended to gravitate towards other invisible kids in school, trying to befriend them. That way we were all invisible together. The mailbox is real. My grampa (mom’s dad) built it out of 1/4″ steel to protect it from idiot gun-happy neighbors, and he erected a post near it with a couple of steel bucket lids painted as targets for their mindless, drunken, redneck shooting pleasure. The mailbox was at a T-intersection just over a mile from our farm house, and that intersection was a school bus stop for some of the rural kids who lived out our way. My older sister and I rode the school bus 25 miles each way every day until I was in 3rd grade, when my mom began working at a grocery store in town, and we rode to school and back with her after that. Prior to that, several times, when my mom forgot to pick us up at the mailbox, my sister and I had to walk home. A mile and a quarter is a long way for a little kid, especially after a busy day at school, and it seemed longer to my little kid’s perspective. It was so quite out in the middle of nowhere at 4:00 p.m. No one around, the roads empty, the air still, the hot sun overhead. Even then, we were terrified if some vehicle drove past. Once, my great-uncle stopped to offer us a ride and I didn’t recognize him and I absolutely refused to get into his pick-up truck. He laughed and explained to me who he was and I felt stupid. I was a sensitive kid, an overly cautious kid, and I didn’t want to get into trouble. 😐

      I based the little girl on several people I’ve known. There’s a lot of me in that little invisible kid standing by the mailbox at the bus stop. I wish we humans were a decent species, one that cared about each other, one that loved instead of hated each other. Invisible children are a symptom of a malignant species. It’s unconscionable.

      Thanks for your kind support as always, my friend. I’m glad you found this one to your liking. Lots of love to you and Scott. 😊

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      1. You are welcome and believe me all your work is to my liking. I think this just resonated with me so profoundly because I too was an invisible child. I am guessing there was a reason why your mom didn’t pick you up on those days. My guess is your dad would not let her. I knew as soon as I read it that the mailbox story was a true one. I remember kids putting dangerous things in mailboxes and the shooting of mailboxes and signs especially. That is interesting that your dad put up alternative targets for the kids to shoot.

        I loved this piece because it described so well the desperate feeling to fit in and how difficult it is when you live in fear someone might show up at your house, due to extreme craziness occurring inside. Friends are important when you are a child. That invisible child is even more obvious to me today – I can spot one in a crowd only we know that something is off – just a brilliant piece Mike. I know there are many people who read this piece and felt that feeling they had for what ever horror existed at home. Thank you for sharing it with us. We both send our love 💕 Mike.

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    2. Thanks, Joni. I should clarify that my mom simply forgot to pick us up a handful of times. She’d be busy with something and lose track of the time. My dad would get home from his job at the uranium mine at 5:00 p.m. so he was never there when we got home. My mom would just forget sometimes. Back then, it was a little safer for kids to walk home from school. My mom and my aunt, who were raised on the same farm, had to walk about three miles each way to their little one-room country school every day, even during the winters, so it wasn’t really too big a deal for my older sister and me to walk a mile and a quarter occasionally.

      My grampa was a character, for sure. His putting up the targets by the mailbox was brilliant, and he had to replace the targets a few times due to all the bullet holes. I think our neighbors were just too dense to understand that my grandpa had won that little war over the mailbox! 🎯😎

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    1. Thank you so much, Michele. You’re so kind, friend. And you’re right, of course: one person can change another person’s world for the better. We’re all in this together, after all.

      Wishing you a better-than-average rest of the week! 🤣 Just kidding. I’m wishing you a stellar remainder of the week, and a happy start to spring. 🌸🪻🌻

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    1. Thanks, Cindy. It’s an odd poem, but I felt like those invisible people needed a voice, you know? So many people fall by the wayside and are forgotten, and it’s tragic. It’s so easy to be kind and acknowledge our fellow humans. It can literally be life-saving. I wish the human race was more compassionate.

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  17. This is such brilliant writing, Mike. So many people around us live this invisible, unacknowledged life. I used to imagine how they felt until I realized I, too, was disappearing from everyone’s vision as well. It’s so easy to become invisible and fall off the grid. And people just move on.
    I try to fix it… I try to make sure every voice matters, and everyone is seen. But in my quiet moments… I feel most invisible myself.
    All of these verses resonated with me.

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