The Unfriendly Woman Next House Poem by RIC BASTASA

i met a woman
at the cottage by the beach
with a daughter
who by her acts love being
unfriendly

i must have misunderstood her
right to privacy

i understand it now
for like me she must have been nurturing
a wound

rubbing it with the balm of grief's silence
leaving it to the cares of time

believing that no word from another can heal it
no concern can cure it

that what hurts should better be left to the care
of themselves
automatically healing without
anyone's unnecessary intervention


when we meet i look the other way
as a sign of respect for her chosen indifference

perhaps it works for her
so many times over and over again
perhaps that is the same reason
why she is in this place
isolated but never ostracized