Like a dark-winged moth
coveting a flame that will surely kill her,
she sits just inches from the light –
a plastic monument
similar in shape to London’s Gerkin,
only smaller and many miles from the Thames.

The last time she went there,
London’s Southbank,
was years ago.
The closest she’s been since was dinner in Eton:
same river, different town;
an hour from the capital.

She wonders how much it has changed
and if it has missed her?
She wonders if any of her friends still live there
and which of them remember her when she did if they do?
She wonders when she will go back and if she ever will,
why she would want to?

She wonders why she wonders about things so much
when wondering only creates problems
she has no idea how to solve?
Wondering this,
she decides to stop;
only it’s not that simple,

and somehow,
wondering about the little things,
the trivialities,
helps stop her from thinking too much
about the things that really matter,
like family and friendship and love.

by Rebecca L. Atherton

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