She passed me in the hallway
with books held up against her side,
and nothing happened.
No choir.
No great bell.
No bright mark split across the day.
Only this
I forgot what I was thinking
for half a second,
which is more power
than most people ever get over another.
I wish I had some noble line
to pin the whole thing down.
I do not.
She walked by.
I watched.
The floor kept being floor.
The lockers kept their stupid green.
The bell rang on.
Yet all that afternoon
the day had a shifted feeling,
like a picture hung straight
in the morning
that somebody had nudged crooked by noon.