Intimate Stranger
By Barbara Siegel Carlson
You don’t look at me directly
only glance across the table
Your black coffee eyes hold time
lost before and after us
half filled with an intoxicating drink
Your voice hushed as mine —
Is it rain, relief, or grief
that flows through every street?
And still I walk with you
past dark shoe shops, cafés
and clinking glasses
to an empty table
Here, we sip some wine
A few drops stain the night stones
Copyright © 2020 by Barbara Siegel Carlson.