All human life... the Nexus Lost Property Worker's tale.

Ladies tinted Specsaver glasses, Silver Sony CMD J70 mobile phone, Tesco carrier bag containing black and white Adidas trainers, Denim make-up bag with hair bands and make-up, Silver bracelet with hearts and stars, Ladies purple brolly...

She says, You know it's a bit like poetry when you read it. I says, Is it? I never thought of that. She had the book open on her knee. The one where I enter everything in. Young lass. Came to interview me for the local paper.

I says, All human life is here. I'm showing her the boxes at the time. Where I keep everything. All of it labelled. Scarves and gloves. Brollies. Mobile phones and cameras. School books. Jewellery and glasses. Naked City? I say. On the telly? But, of course, she was too young. Never heard of it.

She says, What's the biggest thing you've had left then? I says, Bicycles. Dumped on the platform. Stolen most likely, like the video recorder and the hedge trimmer. She says, D'ya ever get... you know. I says, Oh aye. Dirty magazines? They never come to collect them. She says, What about... like suspicious? I says, I had a coat once with the six inch blade in the pocket, that do you? Belonged to a German tourist. Said he had it for peeling apples. Said it was legal in Germany. I says, Not here, bonny lad. The police have got it. Afterwards I thought, Bloody hell. They must have apples some size in Germany.

You have to be part detective in this job, I often say that. I spend half my time tracing people, getting stuff back to them. Following up leads. Scraps of names and addresses, newspaper cuttings in wallets and photo-albums. Ringing schools for the gym bags, the books, the blazers.

She says, People must be grateful. I says, You'd be surprised. Sometimes they're nasty. Mainly when they ring up and haven't got it. They say, I know I left it on the Metro. Like it's my fault. Like I should have it. Like whatever they've lost is on some magic piece of string, so that in the end it'll make its way back to me here in the Lost Property Office at the Central Station.

She says, Tell me. You should know. Are people honest? I says, Yes. I'd say so. I says, People hand in a fivers here, tenners and more often than not they don't bother to claim them even when no-one comes forward. She says, What's the most you've ever had handed in. I says, Five hundred pounds and she whistles softly. Then she repeats it, sort of lingering over it. F-i-ve hu-nd-red po-un-ds. Then she looks at me straight says, I've always wondered you know...

I says, What? I think I know but, frankly, don't really want to hear it. It's like it's .. I don't know.. almost offensive to me. It goes against what I am, which is all about getting stuff back to people. But her pen's stopped now. It's lying limp, flat on the page. She's staring into the air. She says, Just supposing... you were up near the end of the line.. Kenton say.. and you're the only one left your end of the carriage. And then you see it lying there under the seat opposite... a brown envelope say... and you pick it up and flip open the end... and you can see they're big ones... not the fives or the tens... but the big ones... and you look around and you know no-one has seen you.

She says, You know. And she's looking at me hard now. If you thought you could get away with it... She says, Who handed it in? I says, An old woman. Hard up, I'd say. Distressed. Distressed? she says. Which is when, all of a sudden, I understood it.

Because I'd never quite figured it out before. The way finding the stuff had seemed to make her so unhappy. The way she pushed it so hard under the glass of the window. The way it seemed like she couldn't wait to get it out of her hand, like it was hot, like it was... burning her fingers.

All human life is here. She says, What do you do with everything that's left. I says, We auction it. For charity. Every 18 months or so although now, I guess, it'll be more often. Why's that? she says. I says, Because there's more stuff? Why? she says. And I says, Well it's obvious isn't it? The Sunderland extension.

A dozen more stops on the system now. A dozen more chances for you to leave behind what you got on with. Your glasses, your mobile phone, your school books, your Adidas trainers. The new jeans you've just bought, your lap top, your digital camera. Your wallet, your swimming gear, your packed lunch, your pension book, your brolly, your make-up bag, your bracelet with those hearts and the stars, your photo album, your dirty magazines, your large brass elephant...

An elephant, she says. How can you leave a brass elephant behind? But I can't answer that. All I can say is what I always say which is all human life is here.

All human life. Left behind. One way or another. On the Metro.