I Only Wave My Hand To My Neighbor Poem by RIC BASTASA

i only wave my hand
to my neighbor
not wanting to go beyond
that intimacy or
that familiarity which i have always
thought of
(as others do too)
as a breeder of
contempt
& i do not want that
to happen,

sometimes, we choose the luxury of
our own privacy
the dignity of our own hideaway
inside the pages of a book
in the busy world
of our minds
we dance there
alone with our own hands
to the sounds of the patting of our
own feet.