I see
In a vast bar
On the edge of my past
A boy so lost amid the crowd
And you,

There was,
In the mayhem,
A sense of happening,
A feeling of the familiar
In you,

Brown shirt
And dark blue jeans,
Gaze so deep to drown in
And a gentleness that caught me
Unaware,

In truth,
I had not seen
Or noticed you come in
But from the moment I saw you
I knew,

You were
The smile I sought,
The acceptance I craved,
The friendship I needed to find
At last,

I was
The curious
Little bird who’d found flight
And a place to perch in Paris
But then
In France
I was foreign,
A fool to fortitude
And invisible to all eyes
But yours,

I found
As time trickled
A fondness in that find,
A connection in the chaos
To last
Past boys
And men who came
To try us and test us
To see us laugh and to see us
Fall down.

I will
In these few lines
Try my best to thank you
For taking the time to see me
Back then,

The smile
That you offered
On that night, in that bar
Made a fearful foreign young boy
Feel home.