Listener of Sidewalk Traffic
Through the modest window above their bed,
the young woman lay still and listened to voices
of passersby with words lifting and falling.
She waited in the dark for coolness to find her.
Her fast ears wandered and scanned the surface
like a submarine, shyly listening. Outside, townsfolk set down heavy yokes
and let jokes, simple joys, and fragments of the day
fall from their lips like Hansel and Gretel
dropping crumbs of bread. Sidewalk traffic
walked and talked freel