Until Then
I was reminded of poetry this week. This was written some time ago.
Until Then
The story didn’t come tidy fully-fashioned
for efficient consumption,
It came in glimpses.
The language of images captured
or created
then shared or withheld
Like catching a minute shift in a jaw
set by years of slights
or noticing the fine hair on his forearm
as it rested next to hers
without thought.
Even standing
utterly transfixed by the light silhouetting trees at dawn
changed with each blink.
These were the moments that gave her pause—
clues that raised questions of what was
yet to come.
Impending scenes of a flushed face
and damp, auburn hair on a creaseless brow,
the nearly imperceptible flashes of concern
during yet another round of comfortable bickering,
or at the close, holding a frail hand
with a softness that belies its years.
Vivid, beautiful and wrenching,
They each took their place along an invisible line.
It extended forward and followed a path she pretended to know well
on a map bounded by a fallacy
Then was when the real things would happen.
