central park. helicopters, loud metal flutter, man sits homeless across from me. he's peaceful, enjoying the day just like me, we both have pretzels, the Pope's motorcade is a few blocks away, I have somewhere to be in a while but the man still sits there, across, and I can't, want to give him something, and the trees are dusty pale green, new green, it is April, the end, not Eliot's, but almost May, and we sit while the copters circle around the Pope me and
this man, alone on different benches, among the birds and the strollers, women and dogs, children and tourists, all around us, pollen thick in the air, it coats our tongues, our nostrils, he leans
to one side, hand on his chin, the other on top of his thigh, he is pensive, or maybe just weary, and I feel something watch me over my shoulder, something knows, maybe he knows, maybe we are sitting in the park, not too far from the epicenter of the Pope, averting eyes and writing poems about each other (he has no paper, but maybe that's not his style) while the Pope in his drape-white, smooth, moves outward, outward
into unknown masses circling, nucleus to the helicopters and the crowds, but this man and I, we only need spring, need bits, flashes of understanding, we are alright, unmoving, with our pretzels and our loneliness, we are like the sea, not the rivers that penetrate it.
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