I met Neal in my early 20’s
he was a professional musician
who I managed to impress with my musical taste.
We talked about the past life we shared in France
I was a young catholic priest
who died of bubonic plague
laying in my own open coffin, waiting to be closed,
in the dark basement arches of a French cathedral.
I knew him as a young woman
who lived in the countryside with her father.
Though my dying thoughts were of her
standing on the hill in front of their cottage,
the karmic association was fleeting.

I was not attracted to Neal,
though he looked very much like you.
We only kissed good night once.
But sometimes our eternities swirl
around the same vortices,
patterns we barely notice
coincidences, surely
...and yet