CITY SOULS
by Ken Siegelman

Shaman in Korea
Marry the souls
Of single men
To single women
Who die only days apart
Of one another.
Everyone understands
Because loneliness
At any level
Is the greatest cruelty of all.
We brush against
Each other
At the theater,
And in trains and buses;
Scurrying to our apartment floors
With city poker faces
We hope will hide
The fear and disappointment.
sometimes we remember faces
Fashion statements
And even idiosyncrasies
As the minutia of the moment;
The fleeting, futile photographer
We cast out
Like the morning fisherman’s
First few throws
To wake the sea into familiarity...
She lived here
For as long as we remember.
She always got the Sunday paper
early.
She wore long beige gloves.
We thought we heard some screams,
But who could tell for sure
Right off the avenue.
No one claimed her remains
And no one was arrested
For the murder.
She went off to Potter’s Field
As if she hadn’t lived at all,
And we have no shaman here
To wed her soul
In the company of another,
No way to make her
More in death
Than when she was alive.