Afternoon in Boston

Past the fragmented corners of a Sunday afternoon

Struggling against a night gone too soon

I sit.

I listen.

I talk.

I talk too much.

Bombarded with option and consequence

Sipping tannic acid from a ceramic glass

I sit.

I listen.

I dream.

I don’t dream enough.

More free than I ever have been, and less free every day.

I watch the parade of past present and future pass away

I sit.

I listen.

I wonder.

Do they judge me this way?

Giving over to something new

Something borrowed yet true

This is growth

The present gently taps me on the shoulder

I raise my gaze from this old manila folder

I sit.

I listen.

I smell the roasting coffee

I hear the undergraduate student strumming her guitar

I see the runner smirk judgingly at the parked cars

I sit.

I listen.

I am here and nowhere else.