Magdalena and Selene

I knew a girl named Magdalena once,

a long time ago. She was smart and beautiful,

*

honey colored hair and cat green eyes,

a terror on the basketball court,

*

quiet and modest and elegant.

We ran in different crowds,

*

such as they were in our little town,

and while she was omnipresent

*

and visible every day, we did not know

one another well at the time.

*

We connected later in our lives,

with marriages ended or ending,

*

over a love of photography and

the need to just talk to someone

*

who offered support and encouragement.

She introduced me to Brene Brown,

*

I introduced her to the Buddha,

and we gave one another comfort,

*

freedom, helped one another find

joy, feel laughter, know that we

*

each were alright, no matter what

we’d endured or were enduring.

*

I suppose I loved her, at least a little,

and that has always been tricky for me.

*

Magdalena loved the moon, in every phase,

but especially the full moon, big and bright,

*

casting otherworldly light through the darkness.

It fascinated her that the same moon she saw rise

*

and cast shadow would be visible to me

or to her sister, or our mutual friends,

*

all separated by hundreds of miles,

but all bathed in the Titan Selene’s

*

cool glow. All of us apart, but somehow

still connected. All of us, wherever we were,

*

enough, just as we were, for at least those

hours in Selene’s gift.

*

Magdalena and I eventually parted ways,

after I badly fumbled an emotional test.

*

But when the daughter of Titan Hyperion

makes her arrival every 29 days,

*

when Selene rises in all her glory,

I’m reminded of my dear friend,

*

and I wonder, just a little,

what might have been.