The Bench

A text from someone I hadn't heard from in two years

and suddenly sixty minutes disappeared

into a conversation on a bench,

and I couldn't account for a single one.

The tea I brought went cold, the steam

that rose from the cup when I first sat down

long gone into the air like it never happened.

We talked about jobs we don't like,

about people we used to know,

about the way the street corner had changed.

Normal things. Nothing important.

But the hour vanished like it was never mine to begin with.

I kept thinking about the work I wasn't doing,

the thing I was supposed to be handling,

and then I stopped thinking about it

because they were laughing and I remembered that too—

how it felt to be someone who laughed

without checking the time.

When they had to leave, I was still holding

the empty cup, trying to figure out

what I'd been given and what I'd stolen.