An Unfinished Line

We leaned against tall buildings
In the financial district
Absorbing the city
On a cool autumn night
Wondering at passersby.
When we grew bored
We settled into an easy silence.
Good friends feel no compulsion
To talk.
So we warmed ourselves
In quiet.

Then you spoke an unfinished
Line of poetry.
Though I did not turn toward you
I felt your eyes on me.
“Finish that,” was your
Unspoken dare.

So I did.

Not as eloquently as you
But I completed your thought.
We played poetry ping pong
For a long time
Our words swallowed
By the hungry night air
Gone and lost.

I wish I had back those lines of verse.
Not because they were good
But because they were a reflection of us
When we were together
And I will not know that again.

I don’t lean against buildings any longer.
Nor do I go alone into the city
At night
And never into the financial district.
The city smells lonely
And the notion of poetry
Is absurd.

But sometimes I hear an unfinished line.