Meditações - At four o’clock it’s dark

In Winter

At four o’clock it’s dark.

Today, looking out through dusk

at three gray women in stretch slacks

chatting in front of the post office,

their steps left and right and back

like some quick folk dance of kindness,

I remembered the winter we spent

crying in each other’s laps.

What could you be thinking at this moment?

How lovely and strange the gangly spines

of trees against a thickening sky

as you drive from the library

humming off-key? Or are you smiling

at an idea met in a book

the way you smiled with your whole body

the first night we talked?

I was so sure my love of you was perfect,

and the light today

reminded me of the winter you drove home

each day in the dark at four o’clock

and would come into my study to kiss me

despite mistake after mistake after mistake.

Michael Ryan