The man with the graying hair, rocking back and forth, toward a foretold fate. Is this how you will live your life, old man—sitting on your porch, counting the people who pass along the sidewalk, or the cars, or the flies buzzing in front of you? Do you measure the seconds, the minutes, the hours by the rocking of your chair—creak-crash, again and again—like a dancer without legs, while you drink beer, smelling of alcohol and cigarettes, smelling of sweat?

You live across from me, across the busy little street. I see you rise from your chair and pace your yard. We never talk. Do you have much to tell—how your day went?

Sometimes I pass by you. We exchange a nod. Do you feel lonely, or does a person grow used to it over time and stop feeling lonely, becoming simply alone? I hope you are not lonely, old man, because I myself never made the effort to befriend you—not out of coldness, nor from fear of inconvenience, but simply alienation.

I let you drag yourself down the street, leading your dog on a leash, and sometimes I wonder—who will go first, you or the old dog? And out of mercy, I hope the dog dies first, because if it is you, what will happen to the dog?

Sometimes you climb into your Ford Malibu—your green, ugly car—you and the old dog, a mutt, and you drive off into the summer haze.

I imagine that this time you are driving toward eternity, but then late in the evening, you return.

I hear the brakes and the creak of the door:

“Come on, Bo, come on, boy”—then I hear the door slam.

After that, you eat dinner, reheated in the microwave, on your porch with a beer on a warm summer evening, and maybe the mosquitoes bother you a little. They bother me. We sit alone, on our porches across the street from each other, and sometimes my soul aches. Sometimes I feel lonely when it’s dark, and I am alone without a friend. I wonder whether it hurts you the same way, or whether you are cold, sarcastic, alone, but not lonely?

And I wonder if you were to read this, or if I were to tell it to you, would you sit there thinking, and I would know that I had understood you; or perhaps you would dismiss it and say:

“No, no, not at all.”

Seated in your rocking chair, you would take a drag from your cigarette, spit on the ground, look at me, and repeat in a hoarse voice:

“That’s not me, boy. That’s not me at all. You didn’t describe me on that paper—you described yourself. It isn’t my truth, but a reflection of your own soul.”