Love at First Sight

Love at First Sight
Wislawa Szymborska
|Both are convinced                                                       |There were signs, signals:                                     |
|that a sudden surge of emotion bound them together.                     |but what of it if they were illegible.                         |
|Beautiful is such a certainty,                                           |Perhaps three years ago,                                       |
|but uncertainty is more beautiful.                                       |or last Tuesday                                               |
|                                                                         |did a certain leaflet fly                                     |
|Because they didn't know each other earlier, they suppose that           |from shoulder to shoulder?                                     |
|nothing was happening between them.                                     |There was something lost and picked up.                       |
|What of the streets, stairways and corridors                             |Who knows but what it was a ball                               |
|where they could have passed each other long ago?                       |in the bushes of childhood.                                   |
|                                                                         |                                                               |
|I'd like to ask them                                                     |There were doorknobs and bells                                 |
|whether they remember-- perhaps in a revolving door                     |on which earlier                                               |
|ever being face to face?                                                 |touch piled on touch.                                         |
|an "excuse me" in a crowd                                               |Bags beside each other in the luggage room.                   |
|or a voice... [continues]

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