1. Seventeen minutes ago, I was in love with the cashier and a cinnamon pull-apart, seven minutes before that, it was a gray- haired man in argyle socks, a woman dancing outside the bakery holding a cigarette and broken umbrella.
2. The rain, I've fallen in love with it many times, the fog, the frost—how it covers the clovers —and by clovers I mean lovers.
3. And now I'm thinking how much I want to rush up to the stranger in the plaid wool hat and tell him how much I love his eyes, all those fireworks, every seventeen minutes, exploding in my head—you the baker, you the novelist, you the reader, you the homeless man on the corner with the strong hands—I've thought about you.
4. But in this world we've been taught to keep our emotions tight, a rubberband ball we worry if one band loosens, the others will begin shooting off in so many directions.
5. So we quiet.
6. I quiet.
7. I eat my cinnamon bread in the bakery watching the old man still sitting at his table, moving his napkin as he drinks his small cup of coffee, and I never say, I think you're beautiful, except in my head, except I decide I can't live this way, and walk over to him and place my hand on his shoulder, lean in close and whisper, I love your argyle socks, and he grabs my hand, the way a memory holds tight in the smallest corner.
8. He smiles and says, I always hope someone will notice.

— Kelli Russell Agodon, “Love Waltz with Fireworks”