If I accidentally crossed your new path,

and we faced each other eyes to eyes 

like two creatures who used to be at

war but have long since had an uneasy

truce, what would we say beyond the 

awkward half glances and fumbling words?

 

Would we mention the days long dissolved

in memory in which we were wound together

and knit with each other into a sacred cloth

that everyone full admired and praised?

 

Or might we instead bring our conversation

to the unravelling: to the unexpected falling apart 

as we found in each other things not so neat?

 

I have thought about this meeting long since

distance has made all things of us fit into the

cloth bags of ‘good’ and ‘bad’, strong and weak.

 

And of late I have pondered us and what

existed for a time that was the stuff of art;

and if, perchance, this meeting did take place

I hope to see you not as foe but as beauty 

that I once held and thought complete.

 

28/2/2022