In B.C. (Before Corona)

Meeting strangers, friendly banter, bumming cigs, puffpuffpass, meals indoors, brunch with babes, chinchín to shouts of cheers, blowing candles on birthday cakes, coffee shops and cute baristas, iced tea refill when you walk in, guardkeeping someone else’s stuff, daily commute, a city known on transit lines, public transportation, the 17 and sub, dreaded Trolley Blitz,

Buskers, at-home perfume hustlers

Let me hear them pipes, girl

Violin vers of r&b, Pawel the Polish-American

Hands out his picture when you tip him

Work! please god! but not! from home!

Morning hello, coffee in travel mug

When everyone buys the daily special

Because when the first one walked in

The lunchroom smelled so good

Dancing in dark and sweaty enclosures

Moved by beat

Not 5 feet, four, dreading

Side-stepping anything closer

Cough and sneeze 

Considered only allergies

Laughing at the season

Claritin-D in close dose reach

People as just people

Instead of possible exposure

Contaminants, perhaps

Inconsiderate party-goers

Now I’ll have a kiss

But make it masked

Intimacy as proximal,

Not something where we touch.