Contributor: Richard Schnap

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Was that me in the corner of a mirror-walled tavern
Chain-smoking Marlboros with fifty cent drafts
Or watching through the graffitied window of a bus
The wounded neighborhoods of a stricken town
Or was I in the back of a crowded classroom
Studying the leaves on the trees outside
Or browsing through albums in a dusty record store
Searching for anthems for a price I could afford

And were you the one with the dog-eared diary
Scrawled with your story in a secret code
Or the one who wanted a house in the country
And five children playing in its flower-filled fields
Or maybe you were only the one I dreamed of
Who didn’t yet have a name or a face
Who I’d have to wait nearly half my lifetime
To hear you sing like a bird before dawn


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Richard Schnap is a poet, songwriter and collagist living in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. His poems have most recently appeared locally, nationally and overseas in a variety of print and online publications.