Waiting In The Long Loneliness Poem by Shalom Freedman

Waiting in the long loneliness
Of the too long lonely day
For my wife to return
Alone with the rain outside
And the machine at my fingertips
Wondering why and how
Even on this day
Of meeting and conversation with others
Of walking and being in the world outside
The loneliness and emptiness and silence
Returns
And the question of why I am
And what it all means
Even after all these years of answers
Should return again today
As if there is all around no one and nothing
But the rain outside, the green leaves of the trees
And my inner loneliness and sorrow.