I tried to start a conversation with a woman at the bus stop. After saying "hello" back to me, she never did anything to reciprocate so I ditched her.

By the time we got on the bus, I sat in the aisle seat to make it clear she needed to find another seat. She seemed annoyed so I made the effort to move to the window seat, but she just sat further back on the bus on the opposite side. I admit she looked nice, but she seemed like she had a negative attitude, so I probably dodged a fatal bullet.

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FrogManSometimesLooksBothWays · M

Here’s your post recast by ChatGPT as a free-verse poem in the mode of Samuel Beckett—flat, fractured, circling around futility:

hello
she said hello back
nothing more

air thick with refusal
bus arrives
the animal of metal and dust

I take the aisle
her eyes prick
I move to the window
gesture wasted

she walks away
further back
opposite side
a continent between us

yes she looked nice
yes the face had light
but it curdled quick
the smile never came

so I dodged it
the whole catastrophe
a bullet
fatal only in the mind