I saw her picking out a cantaloupe
inspecting squeezing considering
thinking it'll go bad
before she can eat it
but still throwing it in her cart.
I followed her to the register and
watched her pick a pack of gum.

I wanted to ask her name
in my dream that night it was Elizabeth
we danced in a country-western bar
though I’ve never been to one before
so my dream-brain conjured it wrong,
empty and smelling inexplicably
of oven-baked cookies.

we were salsa dancing to techno,
and everyone but us were bears,
but the point of it wasn’t accuracy;
a dream is no documentary.
we’d stopped to catch our breath and she’d looked at me,
opened her mouth to say something,
reached her hand towards mine and
I’d barely,
briefly
felt the cool of her fingers on the back of my hand
before I woke up
in a much darker place.