Thought the Hug Would Go on Forever

Years since we saw each other.

We had been close like lovers

without the touch.

W. Bush was president.

We still believed nothing

could be worse. Neither of us

owned an iPod.

We kept our bad habits 

like favorite songs. 

Now this: I, on the sales floor

hiding behind my books, & 

Thou, sharing truth from a panel

in another room—we embraced

like survivors of calamity & loss.

I wished it could stay that way

a moment more; if it did, 

we wouldn’t part until chains

rattled on the ballroom doors.

Ace Boggess is author of six books of poetry, most recently Escape Envy. His writing has appeared in Indiana Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Notre Dame Review, Hanging Loose, and other journals. An ex-con, he lives in Charleston, West Virginia, where he writes, watches Criterion films, and tries to stay out of trouble. His forthcoming books include poetry collections, My Pandemic / Gratitude List from Mōtus Audāx Press and Tell Us How to Live from Fernwood Press, and his first short-story collection, Always One Mistake, from Running Wild Press.