Near Miss
I almost met you
On a Saturday
In Gloucester.
The wind blew easterly.
There was a jar of mums
On a table near the window.
Their yellows were calling
To each other.
Place-names
Were put back
In the pencil drawer
Before I noticed your shadow.
Copyright © 2017 by Fanny Howe. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on June 2, 2017, by the Academy of American Poets.
“This is a poem composed by the words themselves, calling out their sounds to each other. Compared to them, listless human longing for an unknown friend amounts to nothing. I can say that the name Gloucester, so resonant in my mind, set off the poem in the first place.”
—Fanny Howe
Fanny Howe
The author of more than twenty books of poetry and prose, Fanny Howe received the 2001 Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize for her collection Selected Poems.