FOR YOU FRIEND by Ted Kooser

This Valentine’s Day, I intend to stand
For as long as I can on a kitchen stool
And hold back the hands of the clock
So that wherever you are, you may walk
Even more lightly in your loveliness,
So that the weak, mid-February sun
(whose chill I will feel from the face
of the clock) cannot in any way
lessen the lights in your hair, and the wind
(whose subtle insistence I will feel
in the minute hand) cannot tighten
the corners of your smile. People
drearily walking the winter streets
will long remember this day
how they glanced up to see you
there in a storefront window, glorious
strolling along on the outside of time.