She smiles and hands back the extra five
Richard the clerk had given her in error, not guessing that
the boy would have been made to pay it back
from his paycheck.

Seeing a sewer grate lifted from its dock by surging sewer
waters, she stops the car, wrangles the forty pound disc
back to its mooring, not guessing that
the Corolla due in ninety-four seconds would have lost an axle.

She refills the empty sugar bowl in the office cafeteria; she doesn't
take sugar in her coffee. She re-pins the
"ide Hotline 1-800-78" poster back in place on the bulletin board.

She waits to cross with the light
if children stand at the intersection.

These are her moments; she almost loves herself then … takes
a hint of solace from her small unnoticed deeds.

In the bathtub three fifths filled, she studies
the moribund pattern of the tiles a last time, not guessing that
the phone would not ring any time soon.