First Observation Poem by Gert Strydom

Maybe your buoyant smile
first caught my eye,
made me linger for a while,
while other people walked by

while the wind tugged at the fringe of your skirt
you watched me with something like tenderness
with my dark red tie flapping against my shirt
and for a moment in your eyes there were kindness

I had seen you many times before, without really noticing you
as people passing each other on a holy day
at a church sometimes do
but on that day my eyes did stray

and before this the emptiness could have killed
but with you my whole day was filled.