I saw an old man from my window

across the alley sitting alone on his bed.

A table lamp glowed softly nearby.

The room was barren, lifeless, empty

of all but the bed, the lamp, and the old man.

He sat still, staring toward a wall.

I could not see, from where I stood,

what it was that had captured him so.

It was as if I had been absorbed bodily

into an Edward Hopper painting;

he was so alone in his thickening sadness.

It oozed from his window across the alley

like an amoeba blindly frets its way

across a water droplet on a glass slide,

stretching toward its last bit of life.

Instinctively, I backed away quietly

into the growing darkness of my room,

and the silent frailty we all must live.

(April 10, 2023)