Held up in traffic I
saw him walk away
from the corner we
were meeting on after
scrawling on that
building with a piece
of chalk the number
26.
No, it’s not a clue,
my therapist said, it’s
not all about you, I
think he probably
was keeping track of
all the times he was
stood up and you were
26.
But I was not born
yesterday, I thought
at him, the way we’d
fought so many times
before inside my head
about things equally
mysterious as number
26.
I won’t regale you
now with all the
things that seem
significant to me, a
license plate, or steps,
or how the alphabet’s
unlucky (two 13’s in
26).
It took three weeks
to track him down
again (the quotient
of 2 and 6) but if
you want a detailed
accounting see my
Journal pp. 116-200 &
26.