"Train to Versailles"

Parfum rings in my head;

flashes of trees, crag, tunnel, you

keeled over, mad, loving laughter above silence

gasping

nothing: Mum – I -.

I miss who you were.

Whispered words draw ghosts in the glass.

I don’t know who you are.

I smear them all away.

But I love you still.

Unflinching,

like raw reality,

they drip into my bag ice cold.

---

By Orapan Srisai, 15 years old

"I was listening to this song called Perfume by Mehro with my earphones in, when I was suddenly struck by this image of an older woman doing the same thing on a train. The song envelopes her entire being, the same as someone's perfume in the carriage, and she cannot differentiate between the two because they are both so overwhelming. She's staring out the window, as we are prone to do, and she's on the way to visit her son who has been imprisoned for a crime."