The Encounter

She was walking down the subway—
her strangeness had worn away,
the purple of her skin,
the chalk-white cream upon her face,
the folds of fat arranged so carefully
I could not know her from afar.
 
Would you have known me?
Would it have been right to say so?
So many rains gone past,
so many springs passed through,
flowers climbing over roof doors,
settling by attic walls,
nesting in mortar cracks where no sun entered.
 
Those days were disobedient,
loneliness-filled;
now the turning back is terribly hard.
 
You—
and the man behind you,
stout of frame, quite fitting,
a good choice,
you are fortunate.
In these days,
these lives,
with rising prices,
with battles approaching,
one must have certainty,
dependence without end,
a weight to be carried onward.
 
This time, the choice has pleased you, has it not?
To recall the past
would only become unnecessary,
for you are made straight,
no longer fragile, no longer uncertain.
To be happy here is a challenge
greater than the change of governments.
 
A good house—no longer cheap.
Crossing the street,
sometimes I feel the fear,
sitting by the window
to see the face of a stranger.
Remember:
the chin heavy with fat,
the address of the mind oil-slicked,
the smoothness of the skin grown greasy,
the feet heavy upon this known road.
 
I too consented in this life—
long learning by stumbling,
bearing the weight of ancient unsaid things.
 
That one glance you gave, from afar,
indifferent—
it told me I was no longer in the body,
and you no longer in the eyes.
So there was no new introduction to make.
 
The man behind you,
with a faint smile, passed forward,
so like a familiar one—
yet not.