October, 2022

I go to baggage claim a few days early

To wait for you

I check the message board

But your day of arrival

Is not yet listed

Although your flight number appears

So I practice

My song of meeting and greeting.

A vast array of old

And sculpted

Infantile and exhausted

Gather at the carousel

To listen to the music

And watch the spinning containers

In all their many mesmerizing shapes and colors.

People reunite with their belongings

Loved ones come to greet them

Anxiety is resolved

Hope and trust renewed

I witness this

Strangers lifting stranger’s luggage

Faces scanned

In the hopes of recognition

And look for you

But no one is as beautiful

And no one runs to greet me

So I study well how it is done

What happens to the eyes

When luggage or a loved one is recognized

The use of the hands

In waving and greeting

In pointing and grasping

How lips part and join

The sight of folks leaving together

A sense of mission accomplished

And lives to be lived

Good things happen at baggage claim

I have witnessed this

And in that joy

I await you.