A poet showed up today.

I was sitting on a bench by the mailbox next to cafe seventy8 writing a valentine to Ms. Opal. A slender man in a worn jacket and work pants stopped near me. He said, things’ve really changed around here. I kept writing but asked, in what way have things changed?

Within a minute, he was quoting someone’s poetry he once read at a nearby coffee house whose owner has since passed away. Then he recited another poem, his own. He spoke in a low rhythmic voice, facing across the street into the chill gray.

Before he walked off, he crossed the street to tell his boss to come meet me. I put the red envelope in the mailbox. Pierre, a big, strong man, confused to be sent to me, told me he wasn’t the poet’s boss but his friend.

It started to rain. I zipped my jacket higher and left, but looked back to see the poet return to join Pierre at the truck.

The second poem had been truly marvelous, more so than the first. When I'd told the poet that, he turned his head away. I think he cried, and that's why he left.

I don’t have a great memory, but the last phrase went something like this:

break the silence with the thunder of a word