Today it shuffles past your house
much like a stranger leaving town
who's used to an averted gaze,
pretenders playing lost in thought,
old faces shrouded in the news
when it meanders slowly by.

Sometimes it coughs to catch your eye
or checks its watch then waits to see
if just for once you nod hello
or maybe make the smallest talk.
Of course, you don't, and soon it leaves
as it has done throughout its life.

And that's too bad, because that was
none other than a choice you had,
your chance for change personified
left lingering in disregard,
the lovelessness of indecision,
yet never far from consequence.

Indeed, it could come running back
if you should only ask its name
or let it tell you what it knows
or show you some amazing place.
Tomorrow, if it walks this way,
what will you do? What would you say?