the stoop -

The stoop is not decorated.

Not adorned with string lights or potted plants.

It’s concrete. With wrought iron rails on one side.

And three steps. One, two, three.

It leads to a forest green door.

And it’s simply a stoop.

But,

when I close my eyes, I see a memory of three women.

One, two, three,

after a trying day at work,

settled on the stoop.

One planted at the top step,

Another seated on the second,

the other standing by the stoop’s side

And, as the sun makes its way gently to rest,

these three women share a single cigarette.

The one from the light blue pack

And they each, when their turn comes, slowly take a drag,

then slowly breathe out

One woman closing her eyes to the slight headiness of that draw,

the way it causes her mind to momentarily vibrate and hum,

like she imagines the planets are doing, right now, at this very moment,

then she opens her eyes, passing the cigarette,

to her friend

who vibrates and hums, not because of the pull, but because that’s simply how she exists in this world.

And the first woman is already stricken by this moment.

As someone walks across the street with their dog. And another person enters the liquor store owned by the Korean ladies.

The first woman stares up and up at the trees that arc over the street in an attempt to reach out and touch the branches of the trees on the other side,

reaching -

Almost there, almost there.

And this woman is in the moment but she’s beyond it too. Mourning, in its passing and its going.

Slipping through her fingers, and rising like the pale smoke that exhales from the other woman’s mouth, the lit end of the cigarette already dying. The glow of the ember once bright red, now black, crumbling ash.

The woman standing says, “One more?”

The three smile, laugh, and say, “Just one more.”

And the third woman walks up the steps, that lead to the forest green door,

to slip inside for one more cigarette

for the ladies on the stoop.