I met her first
in the afternoon,
in May,
When the streets
were crowed with people;
living their lives.
She stood leaning
on an old green postbox.
She was a friend of a friend.
She said she had seen
my face before somewhere,
I was not so sure, I undoubtedly
would have remembered hers.
Her face was like
an actress' from the '50's,
one that was usually
reserved in black and white or
preserved in monochrome,
Bette Davis style.
But nonetheless it
was there before me,
in youth and charm.
The way she spoke and
pronounced certain
words peculiarly,
she was very like
myself in that way.
Its been said,
that if you get everyone
on Earth to stand in a line,
one by one,
that you will never find
someone just like you.
But I think that
sometimes you
come close, and
I surmise that
I came pretty close
that day.
I wanted to tell her,
but did not;
Knowing how absurd
it would sound,
I grasped it inside.
She moved
when she spoke,
just a child would
be all jittery and
unable to stand
still after too many
sugary things.
Always, there was
that that hyper-activeness
running through
her body like
electricity.
But all the while,
her voice was silk.
She had my humor too,
anytime I made jokes,
she would laugh.
It was such a
brilliant laugh,
the kind that poured out
and poured
out in big bursts
and did not give a ****
who heard
or judged.
Even when she was
slightly smiling,
you could still
see her teeth,
perfect and white,
like a toothpaste
advertisement.
She was not afraid
to look anyway at all.
Her face was
naked without makeup,
she did not paint over
any blemish at all.
She knew that people
had their flaws,
and it was those people
who laid their
flaws bare to the world,
they were the ones
the brave ones.
- Jamie F. Nugent