I looked out the window
My chin resting on my open palm
The glass fogged
As I peered out
Cars filled with people
Some lonely, some afraid, some dead inside
Some looking for life, and some giving up on it
Trees blending into one another
Black top, yellow lines
Black top, yellow lines
I pulled up my sleeve
And wipe away the clouds
Forming on my window
I watch more cars pass by
In a hurry to reach nowhere
Each face in the car
Blank as they stare forward
Eyes only on the destination
Not the beauty on the way
A car pulls along side us
Silver and low to the ground
A mom talking on the phone
But in the back
Sat a little girl
She was looking out of her window
Right at me
For a moment I just stared back
It felt like an eternity
That our eyes were latched together
In that instant
I knew her
I knew her whole life
And I am sure she knew mine
She was the daughter ignored
She made her own world
Because the one she had
Had no place for her in it
I could see her parents in her eyes
Arguing, yelling
She heard it all through thin walls
And cried herself to sleep at night
She was the odd man out
Always the child in the back seat
She didn’t need them
Or their fickle love
She had all she needed
But not all she wanted
She made her own way
Through a treacherous life
And always would
I raised my hand
And waved to her
I smiled and nodded slightly
And she did the same
And our cars moved on
Our worlds separated
Just a moment
That our worlds touched
I wonder what she saw in my life
What she thought
Of a stranger through a car window
I just sat back and smiled
My mom looked over at me and smiled back
“What are you smiling at?”
“Nothing” I reply
Because no one could understand
How I understood
So I keep her world a secret
Locked tightly away
Of a daughter ignored
And a world passing by