Plight of the Troubador's Friend

(for Billy Collins)

Your friend the troubadour
goes each evening to stand under some other woman’s window
You proofread his poems
and lay a sisterly hand on his head
when he returns each evening lovesick and disappointed.
He reads you his sonnets, asking
“Will they work?”
You do not tell him that they already have
and wonder what would happen
if he glanced up from his lute and into your eyes
or read through the poems that you pen late at night.
But you have long since decided
that you would rather hear him practice his songs on you
than never hear his voice at all.