Romance

Cutting through the fog banks of urbanity

Takes more than one but less than two martinis.

Within that zone the glimmer of a smile

Begins that might come to illumine a heart --

A metonymy for the random rivers

Of feeling coursing through human bodies.

Dim lights, extended hands above then

Below the table, a murmuring piano:

No wonder the moment is feted while

The lifetime is consigned to duration’s

Gray dustbin. Outside, the traffic throbs,

Newsboys rumor, dusk settles into

Vacant evening. Simultaneously, both

People say something tender but witty.