Seen, At Last

We met on a Tuesday morning

while I suffocated on a dusty street;

but it was grocery day, and I was starved.

(God knows how I hate Tuesdays.)

Pantomimed men and women carried

air-tight briefcases. They never stopped

to notice how sunshine filled towering

skyscrapers, or how storm clouds

shivered on the edge of the harbor.

They certainly never saw me.

But he did. He stood alone,

and crowded sidewalks stretched

around him; people quickened their pace,

clutched their purses as they leaned away

from him. His blonde hair captured the sun

as cement turned silver and hydrants glowed.

He stared at me with weathered blue eyes

that didn’t beg to ask any questions.

I saw myself in a deli shop window,

my unwashed hair and hollow cheeks

and even my wide eyes didn’t make him avert

his colorful gaze. He nodded at the sky, then at me.

Rain fell from the heavens

like daggers of ice, but I was ready.

My umbrella wrapped me in a cocoon,

and I was sheltered before the first drop

touched my skin; yet he didn’t move.

He lifted his face towards the sky,

and he let raindrops dance on his stained-glass hands,

even as they bled crimson. He opened his mouth

as I realized no one else had an umbrella.

They marched on and their skin was flawless.

The dusty sidewalks remained dusty,

and sunshine wrapped around buildings.

The clouds were gone, the sky was blue,

but the storm was in his eyes. He smiled,

and lightning shot through my veins.

A smile snuck onto my face as I looked

into the eye of the storm, but only for a second.

I had groceries to buy, and it was almost noon.

(Thank God it was Tuesday.)