The poem
How beautiful it would be to wait for you again in the usual place, not looking at the door, keeping a lookout in the long mirror, knowing that if you are late it will not be too late, knowing that all I have to do is wait a little longer and you will be pushing through the other customers, out of breath, apologetic. Where have you been, for God's sake? I was starting to worry.
How long did we say we would wait if one of us was held up? It's been so long and still no sign of you. As time goes by, I search other faces in the bar, rearranging their features until they are monstrous versions of you, their heads wobbling from side to side like heads on sticks. Your absence inches forward until it is standing next to me. Now it has taken a seat I was saving. Now we are face to face in the long mirror.
eh, seems rather mundane.
I read the nine or so poems of Hugo's in this collection. There's not enough in them to attract me to get his book or to consider reading his other works. Some are better than others and have a glint of interesting themes, but the words are to square. I see nothing there to make me care.