Meeting Sigrid

I had not seen her for five years
perhaps longer but I was reluctant to look back
and work out which year I had lived in Hannover
and count up with my fingers to 2006.

She had been my landlady
and I had been her lodger
her babysitter
her talking point when friends came round.

At first we spoke in English
she spoke it well because she had lived in Canada.
I was wary of speaking German
my trousers always bulged with a pocket dictionary.

She took me to the Wolfsburg planetarium
she took me to see a ska band play in a pub
across the road.
she cooked for me every night

until I found my own friends.
I still send her children birthday cards
I still look at the photographs
and when I saw her in Norwich city centre I thought

I must have been mistaken.
I called her name and when she turned
my face must have said "God you look so old.
she didn't introduce me to the man she was with

and Moritz was playing with a Darth Vader doll
I guess he doesn't remember me.
you did not mention that Jasper was not there
in the same way that you never mentioned

when I got muddled up with my vocabulary
and when I struggled to conjugate verbs.