Where Did We Begin?

Hollie Hardy

“Beginnings are notation for the symphony of the possible”

                                                                                 ~Maria Popova 

A chance meeting
in a dive bar with cheap
drinks and sticky floors
an amateur local band.  

You recognized
my laughter in the doorway.
Memory in silhouette.
You called my name.  

I’d lost you
in the shuffle of years. I’d lost your painting
in the divorce. Something like possibility
sparkled between us. 

A drink.
A short skirt. 
A clandestine
touch. More
drinks. A kiss
hungry
forbidden alley.
The possibility
of a different life. 

Or did it begin before?
Seventeen years earlier
at a coffee shop. 

You: willow tall, aloof
Me: just married, mean 

I taught you to ride
a motorcycle. 

You taught me to want
things I couldn’t have. 

Or was it the night
you left me
rainslicked and swollen
at the airport
another kiss goodbye. 

Or the day you moved
my desk
in front of the window
our bodies drenched
in urban light. 

Who needs a dining room
you wanted to know
when you can have
a writing room. 

Where every beginning is
a clean page, a new adventure
a poem.

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Hollie Hardy
Hollie Hardy is the author of two books of poetry, Lions Like Us (Red Light Lit Press, 2024) and How to Take a Bullet: And Other Survival Poems (Punk Hostage Press, 2014). She teaches poetry workshops online and is the founder of Praxis Poetry: Weekly Prompts for Poets and host of Saturday Night Special: A Virtual Open Mic. Her work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and published in numerous anthologies and literary journals, including Alchemy, Colossus, The Common, Fourteen Hills, Mixed Bag of Tricks, Passionfruit Review, and elsewhere. She lives in Austin, TX. Instagram: @hollie.hardy Website: holliehardy.com