"Picturebook"

The Thursday he was screening
He saw her in the crowd
     avoiding eye contact.
Somewhere else
A waiter slipped him a note
     and a courtesy:
     "She heard you tonight."
She handed him a picturebook when they met,
Declared it "the only thing I didn't
     pack up from his room."
Two days later she was
     sunning in the park
     with a man -
He
     looked on.


Thursday after that firefighters prepared
To leave the scene of a misdemeanor -
A reel had caught fire and
     set off sprinklers
That wrecked the machines...
As he recouped himself, a boy nudged him
     holding a picturebook -
               and asked for autograph.


In a hushed corner of the city
Among gravestones
A visitor leans back against a
     marble cherub
Preparing himself to
Read
But sobs
     under his breaths instead.