Listening to NPR in Atlanta (for Plumbs and peaches)

I listened to the voice of a woman
I knew nearly fifteen years ago, when
we teetered on the edge of adulthood.

I heard things that were, things that
were not, things that might have been.

I heard the girl next door
humming arias in the dark.

I heard Durham in August and
the diminishing of colloquialism
of South Carolina after the Return.

It was not like listening to the past.

Or living in Atlanta,
Manhattan and Denver.