Yearning
 
Yearning and yearning in the grocery store
the shopper cannot see the clerk he wants.
A family store, these aisles should be her haunts:
he sighs, he glances through the stockroom door.
She always smiles at him and says his name,
sometimes asks questions that dispel his doubt
but, usually, with others all about,
the smile and Hi is all: uplifting, tame.
Some years before, he nearly left his wife --
somehow he stayed.  This girl has married since
and has a child, a handsome little prince.
Now everyone is happy with their life.
Yet his breath catches when she smiles at him;
she’s like his chances, beautiful and slim.

Robin Helweg-Larsen

If you have any comments on this poem, Robin Helweg-Larsen  would be pleased to hear from you.