Keatsian Theme

POETRY

by Robert Herschbach

(New Yorker cover, November 8th, 2004)

Two trains stopped at a station. Two readers,
glancing up from the same well-reviewed
novel. He: ruffled hair, sagacious look.
She: eyebrows lifted in surprise.
Each taking in the sweet fact
of a like soul’s existence. And at the same time
registering the catch: they’re on opposite tracks, about to be sped away
to unshared lives. New passengers crowd aboard,
the doors prepare to close.
The city is many cities,
each large enough to get lost in.

Quick, storyteller: invent a chain of happy
accidents: bring them both to the novelist’s
book signing, or seat them in the same
trending restaurant. In fiction, as sometimes in life,
anything’s possible.

Or let them be, free of future mortgages
and discontents, ignorant forever of the other’s
troublesome quirks. Marry them for a moment:
their gazes aligned as though feeding each other
from the text in their hands.