Writing on Thursday

A Poem

Over the weekend my daughters and I went into an antiques store. While they looked at dated dolls, I picked up a crusty orange-bound, red-spined book. I'm always picking up books. Something about this one, as with so many, just caught my eye.

I flipped to its center, and this was what I read. It's simply titled SEVEN, for it's the seventh entry.

We touch.
Shoulder-to-shoulder.
You can't do more when crossing streets
with mannequins in windows looking back.

I try to match your step--
that way I'm sure of staying close.
You smell like love.
That must be so
for what I smell is dear to me and new.

And so a little walk through town
becomes a journey
a love vacation from ourselves
but with ourselves.

Everything you say is funny
               or beautiful.

Sometimes I forget that old material can be so current. That something written decades ago can touch me today. Until there it is in front of me.

In this poem I recognize something I've never had, but I also (hopelessly, romantically) read my future.

So I bought the book.

LISTEN TO THE WARM by Rod McKuen , copyright 1967.