Conversation with a stranger

Suspended in a pool with a window in the wall A window into a corridor that smells of rain boots and chalk Only look, and you can tell You, submerged in a pool alongside Dear stranger Window onto the same corridor Umbrellas dripping onto the floor Ellipses Puddles as the passersby pause and look Traffic in both directions Casual Any day of the week Each of us knows their own pool Water two degrees warmer than the skin And knows the bit of corridor lit by their own pool’s light I no longer need air You Likewise untroubled The pad of a finger pressed to the other side of the window is unbearably white I am gray And you are gray Three feet of wall between us And I am sorry that you are kept in a pool Yet less alone because you are there With nothing pool-wise to think of Little more than blood to circulate I think of bats and flying fish You think of banana bread made with almond extract and strong black coffee And I think of a red rag rug I never owned How it felt underfoot And you think of blankets hanging from a ladder And I am trying to remember whether I locked the back door Doubting I had the opportunity And you are trying to remember your dog’s name What is eternity What is a fingerprint What more terrifying than time Or cruelty What is happening to our skin here Who stops to watch