Because we all want to write more poems.
No agenda
“Let’s get out of the house,”
I said. You agreed.
No destination in mind
just a stir-crazy jaunt into town.
I wanted to offer something
“We’ll walk in the park or downtown.”
As I drove us to town
you found out a few of your friends
were having lunch at a place;
we stopped in, chatted a few minutes,
walked on.
As ever, you were glued to your device.
I took a cell photo of you
at the town square,
hunched and thumbing in sun-silhouette
beside the fountain’s water jets
that were time-stamped into globs;
a rosy lens-flare UFO hovered nearby.
I wanted to say something to you
something meaningful, helpful
I don’t know when I’ll see you again
and we’ve hardly spoken in the five months
we’ve shared the same roof.
But I stepped around artificial pith and platitudes.
We walked a bit more
looked over a restaurant menu
chatted about sticking to your guns,
then you found your opportunity.
“Can you take me to TJ’s?
I’ll stay there tonight.”
I don’t mind, I don’t blame you.
You’ve learned to be an opportunist.
It’s an adaptation that serves,
given that you don’t drive
and your friends, I imagine,
are wary of your characteristic pandemonium.
After I dropped you off, I wondered
how many such aimless encounters,
how many hours’ “chillin’”
it would take to counter
the teeth-gritted silence
I served you these many months.
- Benjamin Gorman's Shared Poems
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