I saw him before I saw her…(I believe she was holding the door.)
There was a far away look in his eyes as he shuffled his feet on the floor.
I felt a twinge of sorrow for him as he slowly labored past
Each step seemed so difficult…more challenging than the last.
I saw her next when she caught up to him and I thought how nothing could compare
with the smile on her face as she helped him to his chair.
She fixed his hair, she straightened his clothes with an ease, a tenderness…a grace
and as she tended to his every need that smile never left her face.
I did not know this couple whom I assumed were man and wife
but as I watched them endure the ravages of age I imagined younger moments in their life.
The moment hey first met, when they fell in love…when they lived in younger skin
I imagined them with friends and family…imagined all the places they had been…
A lifetime spent in love together was not difficult to surmise
I saw it in the gentleness of her touch…and in the sparkle of her eyes.
When our eyes met for a moment I saw how her smile was masking her pain
and I thought how the more her husband slips away…the more her love remains.
I believe when we happen upon one another…even momentarily in a day
from every brief encounter…we take something away.
It may be a look…a smile…a glance…a gesture from afar
that finds it’s way into our heart and reshapes who we are.
As I left my brief encounter and walked to my car in a misty rain
I thought about that moment…about how she smiled through her pain…
and though there was a hint of sadness as I drove home by the sea
it wasn’t her sadness…it was her love…I took away with me.
A love so beautiful…so everlasting…so quietly proclaimed
It made me smile when I thought of it…
knowing I’d never be the same.
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