they approach me during intermission
as I sink into my chair,
a crowd of people I don't know gathered around
nobody speaking to me,
his voice startles and awakens me,
traveling fifteen feet to me, over the din of this crowd,
but not traveling an inch further-
and carrying my name,
which he could only have matched with my face
through a detailed description of the latter
and a memory not common among eighty year old men.

as he approaches I can see him better:
a few inches short than me
with a large *** belly and hair that is thinning, but still present.
His voice is strong, and his eyes are studying
but he wears a hearing aid that look like a blue tooth for an 80s cell phone
and glasses that are larger than the ones i never wear
but smaller than most of the hundred pairs in this room.
His wife stands next to him:
a small woman, filipino
with a soft, almost absent voice and a gentle smile
but eyes that show the extent of her sadness
and the mass of winkles on her forehead and cheeks
make her appear a decade or more older than she is,
that make the three and a half decade age difference between them seem to shrink.

We speak for a minute, we smile and laugh
and then they leave