It was on May eightieth
during the last leap year
that Elsa
– the thirty three year old receptionist –
met Yakob
– a Lithuanian pedicurist –
who had only recently come to her country.

Elsa
– who worked for the state –
smiled at the younger Yakob
and invited him for a ride
on her beautiful balloon
which sounds more lascivious
than she meant
but because Lithuanian
is truly a far cry from English
Yakob made no inferences
from said invitation.

So they two
– the pedicurist and the receptionist –
took that fateful balloon ride
into the stratosphere
and became better acquainted
for a while
until the stroke of midnight
(and the eightieth
became the eighty first).