I no longer lower my voice
when I say it.
Table for one.
By the window, please.
I order what I like,
linger over dessert,
watch strangers hurry home
to lives I know nothing about.
Once, an empty chair
looked like absence.
Now it is simply
a place where I put my coat.
And someday, perhaps,
someone will sit there.
He will have to ask first.
